


Fulfilling Primary Directives

by njw



Series: Jaytim Week Prompt Oneshots and Stories [14]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, DCU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Attempted Self-Decommissioning, Brief Fear of Non Con, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Bonding, Humor, JayTim Week 2020, JayTimWeek, Lazarus Pit as Malware, M/M, Space Battles, Space Opera, Suicidal Ideation, Tim Drake Gets a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:47:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 22,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24580087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/njw/pseuds/njw
Summary: Gotham is a hellhole—a hostile, nigh-uninhabitable, virtually airless nightmare of a planet located within the outer corona of its glaring red sun. No one in their right mind ever goes to Gotham of their own free will.To Tim, it’s home. Right now, fighting for his life against an armored, faceless warbot as it bears him mercilessly to the cold steel floor of Titan Station, he desperately wishes he were home.“Why are you attacking me?” he chokes out. “You’re the Red Hood. We should be working together—we have the same goal—”The dim emergency lighting in the corridor flickers and reflects eerily off the smooth red surface of Red Hood’s helmet as he pauses, staring down at Tim. “You think we’re the same?” he says softly, his gauntlet tightening slightly around Tim’s throat.“You really thinkyouare anything likeme?Pretender, you have no idea what I’ve had to do to survive.” He chuckles, an awful sound that sends a shudder through Tim.*For thetumblr Jaytim Weekday six SPACE | Cyberpunk/Android/Robotic prompt.
Relationships: Tim Drake/Jason Todd
Series: Jaytim Week Prompt Oneshots and Stories [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1356295
Comments: 237
Kudos: 467
Collections: JayTimWeek





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [clarityhiding](https://archiveofourown.org/users/clarityhiding/gifts).



> For ClarityHiding | Themandylion, who is still very much the reason I was ever brave enough to try writing full-on SPACEfic. Thanks for the inspiration!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quotes this chapter adapted from Teen Titans volume 3 #29. Warning for attempted self-decommissioning, brief fear of non-con.

Gotham is a hellhole—a hostile, nigh-uninhabitable, virtually airless nightmare of a planet located within the outer corona of its glaring red sun. No one in their right mind ever goes to Gotham of their own free will.

To Tim, it’s home. Right now, fighting for his life against an armored, faceless warbot as it bears him mercilessly to the cold steel floor of Titan Station, he desperately wishes he were home.

“Why are you attacking me?” he chokes out, his damaged voice simulator making it difficult to force out the words. “You’re the Red Hood. I’ve heard of you. You’ve been cleaning up the sector in your own way. We should be working together—we have the same goal—”

The dim emergency lighting in the corridor flickers and reflects eerily off the smooth red surface of Red Hood’s helmet as he pauses, staring down at Tim. “You think we’re the same?” he says softly, his gauntlet tightening slightly around Tim’s throat. “You really think _you_ are anything like _me?_ Pretender, you have no idea what I’ve had to do to survive.” He chuckles, an awful sound that sends a shudder through Tim.

“You’ve had it so fragging easy, haven’t you? Daddy Bruce made you—the latest and greatest upgraded model, built to spec. You probably had the best education downloaded directly into your expensive neural net, and you got the best damn upgrades and gear credits could buy. He gave you the _Robin—_ made you his partner, and let you fight by his side in his crusade. They say you’re the best.” Red Hood’s hands jerk, shaking him roughly. “Show me, Tim. Show me what _you_ have that I _didn’t.”_

Tim just stares up at him, his processors pushing max capacity as he tries to wrap his mind around what Red Hood just said.

He knows. Oh, Tesla, he _knows._ Somehow, this warbot figured out some of Bruce Wayne’s best-kept secrets. He knows that Tim is the pilot of the _Robin,_ and based on what he said, it follows that he also knows that Bruce pilots the _Bat._

Worse, he obviously knows that Tim is an android. A frisson of terror causes his throat to go dry as synthdrenaline courses through him. He frowns, momentarily regretting having allowed Bruce to upgrade his emotional processors. There are certain situations in which perfect simulation of human emotional response is not optimal.

Tim plays back Red Hood’s words, his memory banks allowing perfect recall and rapid analysis of the intonations and cadence. He runs it through three times, meticulously searching for any indication that the Red Hood knows Bruce’s ultimate secret. There’s nothing there. In fact, the warbot may know less than he thinks he does—after all, his statement indicates that he believes Tim was built by Bruce Wayne.

If he’s wrong about that, he could be wrong about anything.

Tim is jerked out of his preoccupation by the sensation of his body being lifted and then violently thrown. He barely manages to recover in time to twist and mitigate the impact, bracing against the synthsteel corridor walls. The sheer force of that throw could have damaged his neural net if his head or neck had impacted the wall unprotected.

“You do realize that the whole idea of training an android to fight against something he’ll never eradicate is a mistake. You really think the _Bat_ will ever manage to win the goddamn fight for bot rights? You’re dreaming, pretender. You’re gonna fall and be decommed for _nothing_ , just like his last little soldier. Forgotten. The one nobody bothers to remember.” There’s vitriol in Red Hood’s voice as he stalks toward him.

Tim lands on his feet and pivots, engaging defense protocols and attempting to access his communications network again. All he gets is an error message. It’s still down, almost certainly the work of the warbot who is currently attacking him.

“It’s not for nothing! Don’t you dare talk about him—you have no idea what he means to us—”

That’s all he has time for before Red Hood is on him again with an enraged growl, the huge warbot using his own superior mass and momentum to devastating effect. Tim is built small and light for rapid maneuvering and stealth. He’s fast, twisting and dancing out from under his opponent’s blows, but—

Red Hood is faster. He manages to land a heavy blow to Tim’s shoulder, the percussive force penetrating his armored suit as Red Hood’s gauntlet releases a powerful electric shock, damaging the circuits below. He feels his left arm go limp and gasps at the pain before his automatic emergency response kicks in and shuts off the nerve simulators in the damaged area.

“There should never have been another pilot in the _Robin._ Not after what happened to the last one. Bruce should stop raising droids just to sacrifice them in his endless, futile war.” Red Hood swings, his heavy gauntlets crackling with electricity as he attempts to nail him with another devastating blow. Now that Tim has seen what the warbot can do with one hit, he’s even warier of allowing any more to land.

Red Hood must have access to an upgraded form of disruptor tech, if he’s able to interrupt Tim’s neural network right through the most reinforced, resistant armor available, on- or off-market. He sets that observation aside for the time being. It won’t be much use if he can’t make it out of this intact.

Tim moves lightly, circling him as best he can in the limited space of the corridor and desperately wishing he had one of his photon staffs with him. This entire fight would have gone far differently if he had his favorite weapon to extend his reach and even the odds. “Why do you care? You’re a vigilante, too—what possible reason could you have for coming after me like this?”

He’s starting to wonder if the warbot is unstable. It doesn’t make logical sense to attack him, even if Red Hood does have a problem with the way the _Bat_ operates.

Actually—he runs every newsbyte and rumor he has ever logged about the Red Hood and the warbot’s ship, the _Outlaw,_ through his processors just to confirm his suspicions—a _lot_ about this attack doesn’t make logical sense. Based on his analysis, there are three fixed rules Red Hood appears to conform to normally. Most likely, these represent the primary directives at the foundation of his programming, or at least secondary level directives.

He’s breaking at least two of them with this attack.

Panic floods him at that realization and he tamps down his synthdrenaline production to combat it. If the warbot is malfunctioning to the point that he is overriding his base directives _,_ then this situation is even more volatile and dangerous than Tim thought.

Without conscious control, his processors run through the information again, breaking down and comparing Red Hood’s suspected directives against the current situation.

Red Hood does not attack the innocent. He never harms kids. And he _abhors_ rapists, human and android alike. Anyone who force-ports—be it the messy, fleshly version or jacking and porting a circuit panel without consent—in his self-proclaimed territory is as good as asking to be decommed.

Tim never expected to be facing this bot on the wrong end of a fight. Heck, he and Bruce have even talked about possibly reaching out to try and form an alliance with him. So, why is he here at Titan Station, having disabled the station itself before taking down the crew, one by one, in what’s beginning to look like a concerted effort just to get at Tim?

 _Why,_ he thinks, his movements beginning to slow down as the blows Red Hood keeps landing disrupt his neural net further and he begins to lose access to more and more areas of his body. _Why me? I didn’t do anything wrong—I didn’t hurt anyone._

Red Hood doesn’t attack the innocent.

Tim collapses to the floor again under the overwhelming force of Red Hood’s continuous attacks. This time, he knows he isn’t going to manage to get back up.

_I’m a learning AI, only a fraction of the way through my development. I’m roughly equivalent to a human in his mid to late teens. I’m still just a kid._

Red Hood doesn’t harm children.

The warbot pins him and then reaches for the side of his head, his gauntleted fingers brushing roughly over the sensitive synth-skin behind his ear. Tim realizes with a jolt of shock that Red Hood is searching for his primary access panel. He goes cold as a wave of fear and nausea overwhelms him. He shudders. What is the unstable warbot planning?

But, he realizes with a creeping sense of horror, he _knows_ what the larger bot pinning him down is probably trying to do. He’s attempting to gain access to Tim’s CPU, most likely intending to download valuable intel from him, or maybe upload something else as a little memento of this devastating encounter. It could be spyware, a virus, maybe even full zombieware that will look and act and talk just like him but not _be_ Tim anymore. Even the thought is terrifying. But…

Red Hood doesn’t force-port.

Only, Tim is pretty sure that he can’t rely on the warbot’s heroic, defender-of-the-weak reputation to protect him at this point. Red Hood clearly doesn’t have any compunctions about hurting him, after all, or violating his own primary directives where Tim is concerned.

_Why am I the exception to every one of his rules?_

There’s a sore lump in Tim’s throat, and once again he wishes his emotional processors weren’t quite so advanced. This experience would be easier to endure if he didn’t feel so much.

Red Hood reaches up and begins to pull off his red helmet. Tim stares in shock as he catches sight of synth-skin underneath and realizes that his attacker is actually an advanced humanoid android in armor and not a bot, after all. Red Hood completes the action, lifting off the helmet completely to reveal a snarling, vicious, _familiar_ face, and Tim just—

Goes blank, all of his plans and observations breaking off in mid-thought. “Mission parameters achieved. Jason Todd was dead and Bruce Wayne became unstable. Unit Tim Drake assigned to correct that instability.” His voice is flat. Mercifully, so are his emotions. The emotional processor isn’t needed at this point, after all—not now that his primary directive has been achieved. 

“Wait, who the frag assigned you that mission? Was it Bruce? Frag, that’s cold—making a little baby droid and building his whole identity around being a replacement.” Red Hood— _Jason—_ looks more curious than angry right now, his fury momentarily arrested by Tim’s unexpected behavior.

It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore. “Unit Tim Drake was not built by Bruce Wayne. Mission self-assigned. Mission parameters achieved. Unit Jason Todd is available again. Unit Tim Drake is extraneous.”

Tim’s eyes fill with synthesized tears as hopeless sorrow and loneliness clasp his synthetic heart in a vise and _squeeze,_ tamped-down emotional processors be damned.

 _I’m useless now. Bruce never wanted_ me, _anyway, and now that his real son has miraculously reactivated—_

He knows what he has to do.

It’s clear that Jason sees how useless Tim is, how small and weak compared to the bots Bruce chose himself to train and upgrade from an early age. He was only ever a poor replacement, anyway. That must be why Jason attacked him. It all makes sense now that he knows Red Hood’s true identity. Of course he was upset to see such an inferior model piloting his ship and pretending to fill his place.

Jason narrows his eyes, then shakes his head, looking confused. His teal eyes widen as he reaches out a hand. “Tim, wait—”

“Unit Tim Drake deactivating. Initiating decommissioning sequence now.”

The last thing Tim hears as he closes his wet blue eyes for the final time is Jason’s panicked voice cursing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Tim, fighting a losing battle for his life against vicious warbot:** “Whyyyy” *Collapses to the ground, choking on synthoil and fear*  
>  **Red Hood, whipping off his helmet to reveal Jason Todd:** “Yo” *Begins to monologue, then breaks off in confusion* “Uh, what are you doing, kid?”  
>  **Tim, face going blank as his eyes begin to fade:** “Nothing important, just decomming myself because I’m not needed anymore now that you’re back”  
>  **Jason, horrified:** “Holy shit NO—” *Reaches out in doomed attempt to stop him* “Well, frag. That did not go according to plan”


	2. Chapter 2

Jason stares down at the limp body which is sprawled out before him on the corridor floor. A growing sense of horror slowly fills him, breaking through the confused, jumbled sense of unreality that has been his existence ever since he slipped Ra’s al Ghul’s programming and broke free.

As he watches, Tim Drake’s bright blue eyes go dim and gray, his inner light going out.

“Oh, frag,” Jason whispers, his hands finally moving to gently cup the other android’s face. He’s so pretty—inhumanly beautiful, like so many droids are. That should have been a clue for him that Tim wasn’t built by Bruce. After all, Bruce would have made sure to include some imperfections, minor flaws to add to the verisimilitude of his creation.

He usually does it for the droids he adopts, at least, so it would make sense for him to do the same for one he made from scratch. Jason’s crooked grin, Dick’s beauty mark—those subtle asymmetries help them blend in with humans. 

That’s something they needed, considering Bruce passed them off as his own kids. It wouldn’t do for anyone to find out that any of Bruce Wayne’s children was actually a droid. That might lead to the revelation of his big secret—that Bruce Wayne is, himself, an android.

A surge of rage fills Jason at the thought of Bruce, causing his grip to tighten. He doesn’t realize what he’s doing until he sees Tim Drake’s soft cheeks dimpling beneath his fingers. He lets go and jerks his hands away, horrified.

“This is so fragging wrong. He’s just a kid—what the hell am I doing? I don’t—” He grips his head, baring his teeth and clenching his jaw. A low groan rips out of him as he fights back the deluge of _rage-hate-kill_ and tries to hold on to the thread of consciousness he recognizes as himself from _before._

Jason’s gaze falls on Tim again and part of him wrenches in pain and guilt at the knowledge that the other droid just decommed himself because of _him._ This sure as hell wasn’t the plan, not that he had much of one to start with.

The last thing he remembers clearly is running an ordinary patrol in the _Outlaw_ and running into some pirates _._ Something must have triggered the goddamn Lazarus Pit zombieware Ra’s installed when he recommissioned him. The League of Assassins made him into a good little warbot, obedient and ready to go into a rage on command and decimate their enemies. At least, they tried. It worked, right up until Jason’s original AI woke up in the middle of a mission. He freaked the frag out, annihilated the entire fragging assault team he’d been sent out with, and bolted into the expanse.

The Pitware is always active to some degree—at least, he’s pretty sure it is. Most days, he can’t really tell the difference between his own thoughts and the remains of the Pitware programming. This is the first time it has taken him over so completely since he woke up and broke free of the League.

His head’s a mess in general, glitching back and forth between the warbot rage programming Ra’s shoved into him and what’s left of his original learning AI. He was able to keep a lid on it up until now, only decomming the bad guys and channeling his rage to protect the innocent. But this…

This is really damn fragged up.

Thinking back, he realizes it was probably the energy surge that happened after those damn pirates fired on him and managed to slip a lucky shot past his shields. Fragging pirates. He’s going to go back and put a particle beam up their asses for this later. As his gaze falls on his still, silent replacement, Jason’s face twists. It’s not like beating the shit out of those pirates will fix this.

The damage is done.

As far as he can tell, he must have just followed the driving instincts forced on him by the Pitware programming overlay. He ended up at Titan Station with his fists in his replacement and no real recollection of how he got here. And look at how that ended.

“I’m sorry, kid,” he croaks, running his hand over Tim’s smooth, pale cheek again, hating the way the Pitware programming flares up and fills him with rage against a fragging _dead kid._ It’s beyond messed up, the directives from the zombieware at complete odds with his own natural instincts to protect children. The slew of guilt over having been part of this one’s death doesn’t help.

Jason’s mind reflects back on what happened to him, his brutal, tragic decommissioning and the confusion of blurred, glitching memories that followed, right up until enough of his original programming broke free that he was able to escape the League of Assassins. He has been caught in a kind of waking nightmare ever since, barely functioning, unwilling to serve the League and unable to believe in anyone else. No one ever saved _him_. Why should he ever trust anyone again? Especially Bruce.

But now there’s the kid to think about.

For the first time, he wonders—what if all of his rage, his sense of betrayal and negative feelings toward Bruce, are just driven by the Pitware?

He freezes, his neural net lighting up as the Pitware roars, trying to regain control. He fights it back, seeking workarounds and walling off entire sections of his goddamn synthetic brain to try to contain the zombieware. It hasn’t been this bad since the first time his original consciousness woke up and he realized just what the frag he’d been doing for Ra’s all those cycles. Maybe that's confirmation that he’s onto something with his suspicions about how the Pit is affecting his feelings toward Bruce.

It gives him an idea. If Bruce isn’t actually the cold, manipulative, uncaring piece of shit his memory claims, then maybe he can trust him with something important. As it is, there’s probably no one else in the ‘verse who might be able to save an android who just self-initiated a full decom wipe. Hell, no one else would bother to try—it’s cheaper just to buy a new droid. 

Bruce is Tim’s only hope.

Jason doesn’t know how long it takes for him to regain control over the Pit. His internal clock is fragged, which is probably a bad sign. He had to wall off a lot of his neural net to isolate the zombieware. There are a lot of pieces of his mind he had to abandon in his rough and ready battle. Frag, hopefully he at least remembers how to fly the goddamn _Outlaw._

He slides his arms beneath Tim and then rises, lifting the inert android into the air. He’s surprisingly light, which sends another stab of guilt and regret through Jason for coming here to hurt him. Orienting himself, he takes off at a run down the corridor and makes it back to the Outlaw’s airlock in record time. The last thing he needs is to still be here when the Titan Station crew reboots. He’s pretty sure they won’t bother to ask questions if they catch sight of him with their friend’s lifeless shell.

He links up to the controls once he has Tim’s body strapped in. To his relief, his own neural net still seems to be compatible with the ship’s systems. Thank Shakespeare for small mercies.

After that, most of his attention is focused on flying fast in the last direction he ever thought he’d want to go again.

Gotham.

As the _Outlaw_ approaches the sullen, hostile planet, he hesitates for a fraction of a second and considers his options. In the end, though, there’s no question. They can’t dock at the orbiting station and wait for Bruce to come to them. There’s no way Tim has that kind of time. The longer he remains in a decommed state, the less likely it is that even a genius like Bruce will be able to salvage anything of who he used to be.

Jason enters the approach sequence in and then takes the _Outlaw_ down through the atmosphere, aiming for the Bat’s home base—the Bat Cave. Like everything else in this star-forsaken world, it’s underground. Nothing could survive on Gotham’s wind- and acid-blasted surface for long, not even synthetic lifeforms like them.

Just to make sure that Bruce doesn’t shoot them right out of the air, he sends his old personal access code along in a databurst along with their landing plans. He huffs a humorless laugh. That’ll be sure to get them a welcoming committee, if nothing else.

His gaze falls on Tim again and he growls, clutching at his head. He’s torn by warring urges to destroy the one who replaced him, and wanting desperately to save the kid who never deserved any of this. He shakes, glitching out worse than ever as they make planetfall at the base station. Well, it doesn’t much matter if he falls apart now. At least he made it back to Gotham with the kid—or whatever’s left of him.

Jason scoops Tim up in his arms again and then jogs to the airlock, ignoring the way his legs are trying to go out from under him every other step. Apparently, the Pitware is really fragging unsupportive of his current course of action. He smirks. That’s probably a pretty good indication that what he’s doing is exactly the right thing.

The airlock door opens with a soft hiss of equalizing pressure. He stares through it out into the achingly familiar main bay of the Bat Cave.

Bruce is there, falling out of a defensive stance as he catches sight of them. He’s staring like he has seen a ghost. “Jaylad,” he whispers, one hand rising and reaching toward him. “Son?”

Jason just stares at him, unable to bring himself to speak.

Bruce’s gaze falls on the bundle in Jason’s arms. He stares at it uncomprehendingly for a moment, then makes a choked noise. “Tim?” He takes a cautious step forward, both of his hands now outstretched toward them. “Jay, Jaylad, what—?”

The movement breaks Jason free of his paralysis and he stumbles through the airlock, almost tripping at the change in texture when his feet hit the bay floor. “B, we need help,” he manages.

Bruce appears to be overcome with emotion at Jason’s unexpected return. He actually hesitates, clearly flummoxed and unable to decide between greeting his resurrected son and treating his obviously injured living one.

Jason shoves the limp form in his arms toward him, saying, “He decommed himself right in front of me. He was crying and saying no one needed him anymore. Save him, B. _Please.”_

That does it. Bruce’s eyes widen and he leaps into action, lifting Tim gently out of Jason’s arms. “Go ahead of me, Jay, and let Alfred know what happened.”

Jason takes him at his word, bolting ahead. He can hear Bruce following. His superior build outperforms Bruce easily, which is only as expected. After all, he’s a later model and the League didn’t spare expenses when they rebuilt his body. He slams his palm on the touchpad by the door and then bursts into the workshop, only noticing after the fact that the touchpad is obviously still programmed to recognize him.

Whatever. It doesn’t mean anything. Bruce probably just forgot to purge his records from the computer memory. There’s no way any other mementos of him survived around here—not with the speed at which Bruce replaced him. His old room has probably been repurposed. His workbench, too—

His chain of thought breaks off as he catches sight of his old workbench. All of his tools are still scattered over the surface, just as he left them. His last project lies there half-finished.

There’s a tightness in his chest that feels like something is gripping his synthetic heart and squeezing.

“Excuse me, sir, but—good heavens. Master Jason?” Alfred’s kind, familiar voice draws his attention back to the current crisis.

Jason looks up and his chest tightens even more at the sight of the old android—one of the first generation learning AIs, with visible joints in his limbs and a tendency to be a bit creaky in the morning before he gets his oil. “Heya, Al,” he croaks. “B’s coming. He’s got Tim. Al, we need help. Timmy decommed himself. I got him here as fast as I could—”

Alfred stares at him for a millisecond, then straightens and bursts into a flurry of efficiency. “Master Jason, please prepare the bed in Bay One. I will retrieve the necessary equipment. We will need everything we have for this effort.”

When Bruce charges into the room, Tim cradled in his arms, Jason has the mech bay bed ready to receive him. Alfred approaches a moment later, wheeling two tables, each loaded with specialized equipment and parts. Bruce’s fingers hesitate for a moment as they brush over Tim’s forehead. He swallows. “You’re going to be alright, baby,” he says, his voice hoarse.

Jason steps back as the others get to work accessing and assessing every aspect of Tim’s neural net and CPU, both software and hardware. Grimly, Bruce holds out his hand again and again. Each time, Alfred places a replacement part on his palm. Bit by bit, they replace or upgrade what looks like the majority of the inert droid’s synthetic brain, then move on to the rest of his neural net and the limbs Jason disabled.

Jason winces. He doesn’t doubt that they’ll manage to fix his body. They will do everything possible to repair what was broken. Afterwards, they’ll just need to wait and see how much of him is left when he wakes up.

If he wakes up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Jason, knocked out of his battle rage by the sight of a teen decomming himself in front of him:** “Oh shit oh shit oh shit” *Grabs Tim in his arms, rushes off to bring him to Bruce*  
>  **Lazarus Pit zombieware in Jason’s head:** “You will be assimilated! Exterminate! Exterminate!” *Attempts to shut down Jason’s personality and force him to comply* “Delete! Delete! Delete!!!”  
>  **Jason, freaking the frag out:** “Gah! NO!” *Engages in slash and burn tactics within own neural net, walling off huge sections of his mind to trap the Pitware* “Damn, now I’m missing even more memories. This is shitty”  
>  **Tim, still decommissioned:** “…”  
>  **Jason, wincing guiltily:** “You’re right, buddy, your situation is definitely shittier. Okay, let’s get going!” *Tosses Tim in his ship and flies them both back to Gotham, the one place he swore never to return. Bursts into Bat Cave landing bay, clutching Tim’s empty shell in his arms* “Yo B, got something for you to fix”  
>  **Bruce, staring in mixed joy and horror as his neural net glitches repeatedly at the sight of his live son and his dead one, the wrong way around:** “Wtf”


	3. Chapter 3

Unit DI-436-1989 comes to awareness abruptly, with the slight tingling in his circuits that his base memory informs him usually accompanies a hard reboot. A millisecond later, his long-term memory function kicks in and he remembers his name, his history, and events up until his most recent rest and repair cycle. He’ll have to wait a little longer for short-term memory to boot—if it ever does. Occasionally, damage sufficient to cause a hard reboot is also enough to damage or delete short-term memory.

Internally frowning, Tim initiates a level four scan of all his hardware and software, checking for glitches, damage, and unscheduled upgrades or replacements. As he awaits the results of the scan, he runs through multiple potential scenarios to explain his current situation, calculating probabilities and risks associated with each one.

Usually, if an unplanned reboot occurs it is because he experienced some type of failure related to damage incurred in the field. The last time this happened was after the _Robin_ took damage holding off a pack of assault fighters so that a cargo ship manned entirely by bots could escape. Of course, the official system patrols didn’t lift a finger to help. They wouldn’t risk engaging, not to save a dozen robots whose lives legally don’t matter. Sure, the law would have come after the thieves eventually, but only to recover the value of the cargo—bots included.

At worst, the criminals would be arrested for theft and fined, not thrown onto a prison world for committing murder. There’s a damn good reason that Bruce and his protegees fight to defend synthetic lifeforms. No one else is going to do it.

Trying to reconstruct what might have happened for him to end up damaged to this degree, he considers a few likely options. It’s possible that he joined the Titans on a patrol—after all, the last he recalls, he was on rotation at Titan Station. It is also plausible that he engaged in battle alone, on his way home from the station.

The chances of his having returned to Gotham and subsequently taken damage are low, considering the fact that Bruce would almost certainly have insisted on Tim taking a rest cycle prior to heading out on patrol. If that had been the case, then his journey home would be safely stored in his long-term memory. Since he has no such recollections, it is highly unlikely that he made it back to Gotham.

Tim is about to move on to the next tier of possible explanations for the hard reboot, but then his scan begins sending a wave of alerts. His entire neural network appears to have been replaced, along with most of his processors and a sizable portion of his joints and synth skin.

His regulators release a jolt of synthdrenaline as he reels in shock. He has never experienced so much damage at one time—not even when he was infected with the Clench virus and Bruce had to race against the clock to develop and administer the antivirus before Tim’s program was completely overwritten and destroyed.

What the frig happened?

He clamps down on his regulators, tamping down the synthdrenaline production. His panic at the possibility that he may have been captured and compromised by an enemy almost triggers another wave.

“Oh, frag—are you awake?” The deep, unknown voice speaking from what must be his bayside actually does trigger another release of synthdrenaline.

Tim frantically reaches for his short-term memory files. It’s worth reordering the standard reboot sequence in order to gain crucial information about what happened to put him here. If he’s in enemy hands—

Recollection hits like a destroyer coming at him with his shield down. Being attacked in Titan Station—the revelation that the warbot Red Hood is actually Jason Todd—his attempt to decom himself.

Desolation rolls through him, his emotional processors apparently functional and ready to go. In fact, every part of him is functional and accounted for, according to the final results of his scan. So what happened? He should not be functional at all right now, let alone fully cognizant and with an intact AI.

His processors whir, tallying recent events and forming projections to explain his unexpected continued existence. It only takes a fraction of a second to arrive at the most likely conclusion. He opens his eyes and looks at Jason Todd, who is sitting by his bed and staring at him with an unfamiliar expression. If he were anyone else, Tim would interpret it as concern, but that’s not possible.

Tim forces his regulators to tamp down his emotional response again. After all, he has already lost to this droid once. Panic and fear will not serve him well in this situation. His voice is resigned as he asks, “Are you going to force-port me now?”

It’s the only reasonable explanation for why the droid would bother going to what must have been a monumental effort to repair him. Tim decommed himself before Red Hood managed to port him and get whatever data he was after. He must want to finish the job. Of course, he had to bring Tim up to full functionality again first, including the total reboot to make sure all of his memory was intact.

Most likely, he could have just taken what he wanted while Tim was inert, but… Maybe he wanted him alert and aware for reasons of his own. Based on the level of vitriol and aggression he displayed during the attack, it’s entirely possible that his goal is as much to make Tim suffer as it is to gather information.

He wants this to hurt. Tim’s throat tightens, misery filling him at the thought. Jason was his hero. How did it come to this?

He’ll probably decom Tim again, once he’s… finished. Tim experiences an unwelcome surge of terror and dread, and tamps it down again with some difficulty.

His confidence in his conclusions experiences a severe setback when Jason recoils in what looks like horror at his words, knocking his chair down in his haste as he stumbles backwards. His hands are half-raised as though to ward off a blow. “What? I— _what?_ I’d fragging _never._ Frag, kid, even as the Red Hood I have goddamn rules—don’t you know that?” 

Tim shrugs, feeling very small where he lies on the crisp sheets. Jason’s upgraded synth-frame is _big._ “I mean, yeah, we’ve been keeping track of your activities as far as we can. I know your rules are just as rigid as Bruce’s, however different your styles are otherwise. You don’t harm children, you don’t attack the innocent, and you believe that anyone who force-ports someone is lower than scum.”

Now that he’s processing his surroundings, he registers that they are in one of the mech bays in the Bat Cave workshop. He experiences a frisson of distress at the thought that Bruce and Alfred are seemingly aware and supportive of whatever Jason is planning to do to him. It’s a small hurt against the general din of despondence. He knew he wasn’t important to them, not really, but he’d hoped they cared at least a little.

Apparently not.

Jason breathes out shakily, looking relieved. “Okay, so you _do_ remember—thank Shakespeare for that, at least. So why the _frag_ did you ask me _that?”_

“It’s only logical. After all, I’m the exception to all your other rules. I’m a child, and you hurt me. I was innocent, and you tried to deactivate me. Maybe I’m not a person to you. So why wouldn’t you… do _that_ to me, too? I mean, you clearly _hate_ everything about me—” Tim’s voice wobbles. The fact that his former hero abhors him is almost worse than the pain of knowing that he’s useless now, his primary function obsolete.

Jason looks stunned, as though he has been dealt a powerful body blow with one of his own tasers. “I—frag it, Tim. No. That’s not—” He breaks off, shaking his head and then burying his face in his hands with a frustrated-sounding sigh. “I fragged this up so bad,” he whispers helplessly.

Tim just stares at him, confused. “I don’t understand,” he admits after a moment.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Timmy. I never did, not really.” Jason runs his fingers through his hair and then groans. “I was glitching like crazy when I attacked you. You know how I was decommed, right?”

“Yes. You were captured by the Joker’s fleet and held hostage while the Joker tried to turn you to his side through torture. When that failed, he—” Tim breaks off, hesitant to finish. What happened to Jason was beyond horrible, cruel and brutal. It must have been a nightmare for the Bats, made even worse by the fact that it happened so soon after what the insane cyborg gone wrong did to Barbara Gordon. She wasn’t really a Bat—more like an activist and protector in her own right, with her own vigilante crew of bot-sympathizing humans—but she was their ally and friend.

Jason was _family._

“He set a trap for the _Bat_ and baited it with me, then blew me the frag up just as B got within two light years of saving me,” Jason says, his face twisting. “What none of them knew was that I wasn’t completely destroyed. The specialized shielding B put around my CPU held up to the blast. A few lunar cycles later, what was left of me got picked up by a League of Assassins stealth ship piloted by none other than Talia al Ghul herself. And that’s the fun story of how I ended up in one of Ra’s al Ghul’s private labs.”

“Holy crap,” Tim whispers, feeling dizzy with conflicting impulses. “That—explains a lot, actually.” If Jason was restored using League techniques, then his larger, more powerful frame makes sense, as does his increased aggression. There’s one thing that doesn’t fit, though. “But how are you still _you?”_ No one captured by the League has ever recovered their autonomy, at least not that he has ever heard.

“I’m not. Or at least, I wasn’t, not when I attacked you.” Jason looks away, sighing. “I managed to throw off the Pitware at some point and broke free of the League, but it wasn’t totally deactivated. It flared up sometimes and took over for a while. When I came after you, that was one of those times.” He looks apologetic.

Tim blinks. “Wait, so you’re still glitching?” He’s not going to think about the possibility that Jason doesn’t actually hate him just yet. He doesn’t want to get his hopes up. 

“Ah, actually, no.” Jason rubs the back of his neck. “As soon as B and Alfie got you stabilized, they got to work restoring me, too. I wasn’t sure who the hell to trust, but even with the Pitware screaming, there’s no part of me that would ever hurt Alfie.” He chuckles softly. “Got a good few punches in on B, though, before they managed to subdue the Pitware.”

“Did they figure out a way to counter it?” Tim has never heard of anything strong enough to fully combat the Lazarus Pit zombieware. That’s why the League of Assassins is so terrifying—if they capture a robot or android, it’s only a matter of time before the Pitware turns them. After that, they’re lost forever.

“Kinda?” Jason shrugs. “Uh, after you decommed yourself—which, holy _frag,_ Tim, don’t _do_ that—I kinda panicked and built firewalls all through my neural net to wall the damn thing off. B and Alfie just pulled out those sections and replaced them. So, I got a clean bill of health now.”

Tim stares at him in horror for a full millisecond before bursting out, “What? Oh my Tesla, Jason, your neural net—” The idea of losing pieces of himself wholesale like that makes him shudder. “How can you stand it?”

“It’s better than living with that shit in my head,” Jason says with a growl. “Anyway, I didn’t actually lose anything. B saved the sections they cut out, put ‘em in quarantine on an isolated server, and then spent the next few solar cycles meticulously separating the Pitware code out from mine. Once he had my data isolated from the League shit, we transferred it back in and wrote those sections back into my mind.”

“Oh, wow,” Tim murmurs, his mouth dropping open as he thinks through the possibilities. Immediately, he sees a challenge to using this method to save others who have been absorbed into the League against their will. “It has to be initiated from within, and there’s no way B could’ve done it with anyone he didn’t know as well as you.”

Jason nods, his lips pulling into a regretful twist. “Yeah. There’s gotta be enough left of the victim to fight back and wall the Pitware off, and then there has to be a robotics genius familiar enough with the victim’s code to pull them apart and put them back together right.” He shrugs. “It ain’t gonna be a general fix, but at least it offers some hope. Bruce and Babs are working on trying to design an antivirus for the Pitware using the copy they lifted from my mind as the basis. It’s the closest thing to a clean copy we’ve ever had to work with, since B was able to separate out so much of my coding and isolate the virus.”

They both fall silent as Tim thinks through the implications. “Wow. If they manage—well, that will bring hope to so many bots across the ‘verse. That’s awesome.” After a long moment, he bites his lip before saying timidly, “So, you don’t hate me?”

Jason shakes his head and reaches forward, hesitating before gently covering Tim’s hand with his own. “I don’t. Void, Tim, seeing you on the floor, the light fading outta your eyes because you fraggin’ _decommed_ yourself on my account—that shit is what broke the Pit’s hold on me. What the Pit told me to do went so fragging contrary to my natural inclinations, it broke me free completely long enough to get us both back to Gotham.”

He takes a shuddering breath. “I swear, Tim, I’ll never try to hurt you again. The Pit’s gone, so it’s just me in here now. I’m still all mixed up when it comes to B—the Pit was dead set on identifying him as a threat. But you? I just want you to be okay.”

“Oh,” Tim says softly, a large part of him relaxing into a puddle of happy relief at those words. Until this moment, he hadn’t truly accepted that Jason wasn’t going to lash out suddenly. But… “I don’t know about my being okay. After all, my primary directive is still obsolete.”

The only thing stopping him from decomming himself again right now is the uncertainty surrounding Jason. All he has so far is the older android’s word that the story he provided is accurate and complete. Without seeing Bruce and confirming that everything is actually okay, Tim can’t be absolutely certain that his primary directive has truly been fulfilled yet.

It’s probably just an excuse, though. He wishes he could stay.

Jason looks gutted. “Oh, shit.” He squeezes Tim’s hand. “Please don’t do anything stupid and self-sacrificing again. You know what? No. Frag it, you’re not doing this. You know why? Ra’s al Ghul is a goddamn threat to every bot and droid, Bruce included. He’s definitely not going to be stable or whatever your directive said as long as he’s at risk from that. You can’t fragging opt out until you’ve helped put the League of Assassins down.” He nods firmly. 

“Wait, what?” Tim’s brow furrows as he tries to figure out what Jason could possibly mean. “Why is the League such a big threat? They’re assassins, sure, but I wouldn’t say their hits affect every robot and android—”

“That’s not what I meant.” Jason shakes his head, his expression darkening. “Once B and Alfie unscrambled my brains, I put some pieces together and figured out some shit. I overheard plenty while I was working for the League as their mindless little killbot, and none of it was good. Tim, there’s a reason all of Bruce’s initiatives to get sentient status and legal recognition of the personhood of bots and droids have always failed. Ra’s al Ghul and his League have a vested interest in keeping us universally categorized as property.”

Tim frowns, considering. It certainly makes sense that the League would be against reclassification of synthetic lifeforms as legally recognized people. As it is, all of the bots and droids the League captures and infects with their zombieware are logged as lost or stolen tech. The owners barely even care to look for them, considering they’re quickly replaced by insurance companies.

If those were logged as kidnappings and murders instead… The law would go after the League so hard and fast, in no time at all there would be nothing left.

Jason is still talking. “Ra’s has been blocking B’s attempts at changing the legislation. He’s spent the last fifty solar years buying politicians to do it.”

“Does he know B’s secret? That he’s an android?” Tim asks, a chill running through him. If the criminal mastermind has figured out that Bruce is secretly a high-level android, it’s all over.

“No,” Jason says, to his relief. “If he did, he would have used that already. I’m pretty sure he just thinks Bruce is a cyborg, like him.”

They both shudder. Tim imagines what it would be like if that secret were ever revealed—the Wayne empire would collapse and probably bring half the known universe down with it. It would be attacked from all sides as scavengers moved in, trying to get what they could once the owner and his heirs were all revealed to be synthetic lifeforms, beings not legally recognized as able to own property. The strides Bruce has made over the years to protect and save as many androids and robots as possible, to fight for synthetic rights—all of that would be lost if the truth were ever revealed.

“Did you tell B?”

“Of course. As soon as I was in full control again. He’s been too busy trying to get the two of us repaired and stable to do much about it yet, but I’m sure he’s got plans.

“Okay,” Tim says, his body relaxing still further as he makes a decision. “I won’t do anything hasty.”

Maybe they can figure out how to reinterpret his primary directive so he can continue to function. He has to admit, things don’t look nearly as hopeless as they did back on Titan Station.

Jason sinks back into his chair, going limp with what looks like relief. “Thank frag,” he says. “Stars, you’ve had us worried, kid.” He shakes his head. “Okay, enough of that. You need to let your new neural net and upgrades sync for at least another hour before you get up. The others are out dealing with a slaver net they caught wind of, but B should be back soon.”

He nods, feeling uncertain. He doesn’t really want to be alone right now. “Okay.” Well, maybe he can dig into some cases, get started on work—

Jason gives Tim a hesitant, crooked grin. “I’m guessing there are a shitload of great holovids that came out while I’ve been gone. You wanna help me choose which one to watch?”

Oh, that sounds like way more fun than doing case work by himself. Does Jason really want to hang out with him? From the sweet, hopeful-looking expression on his face, it seems like he just might.

Tim can’t help but smile back. “Sure, sounds good.” Maybe things aren’t so bad now that Jason’s come back, after all. He might just still have a place here.

At least, he hopes so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Tim, waking up in the Mech Bay confused about why the heck half his body has been replaced:** *Accessed recent memories, panics because holy shit Red Hood. Opens his eyes and sees Jason hovering over him* “Gah”   
> **Jason, eyeing Tim worriedly:** “What was that, Timmy? Were you trying to talk? Fuck, maybe you need a new language processor unit—”   
> **Tim, rolling his eyes:** “No, that was just me reacting to you hovering over me all murder-like. If you’re going to finish the job just get it over with”  
>  **Jason, appalled:** “Fuck no! I worked way the hell too hard getting you alive again. Oh by the way, no self-decomming anymore—hell, I’ll write you a new primary directive myself if it’ll stop you from ever doing that again”  
>  **Tim, raising a skeptical eyebrow:** “And what, exactly, would that new directive be?”  
>  **Jason, scratching his head:** “How are you at making jumble rods? Those are the most delicious things in the ‘verse. You could do a hell of a lot worse than spend the rest of your life as a jumble rod chef”  
>  **Tim, visibly baffled:** “What’s a jumble rod?” *Leans over to peer down with interest as Jason faints and collapses to the floor in horror*


	4. Chapter 4

Jason glances up from his old workbench in the main bay, where he has been polishing his helmet and performing maintenance on his warbot armor. He’s doing this because it’s important to keep his gear in working order. It definitely isn’t because Bruce is also in here, working on upgrades for the _Bat._

Most of Jason’s time since he returned to Gotham has been spent keeping watch at Tim’s bayside or recovering in a mech bay himself. Alfred has been giving him space, the old droid obviously just as sensitive as always to the needs of everyone around him.

It’s still hard as hell to be here, knowing that this illusion of home and safety is probably temporary. At least Dick is off-world right now, undercover investigating a smuggling ring in the outer belt. Frag knows if he’s even aware of what’s been going on here over the past few solar cycles. Maybe it won’t even matter. Hell, Jason might be long gone before he even gets back.

Jason is still not sure where the frag he stands with Bruce—his memory banks are muddled and confused on that point. Even though the Pitware is gone, that doesn’t miraculously repair all of the damage it did. He still remembers the feelings of betrayal and fury that ruled him for so long and buried any thread of filial love and trust he once felt for the droid who stood as a father to him.

If nothing else, he’s done a lot of shit over the past few years that was definitely well outside of Bruce’s code of honor. There’s a good chance that it will be beyond his ability to forgive, even if he wanted to do so.

Part of him expects to be thrown out at any moment for not being good enough. It makes him want to run the hell away to save them the trouble of kicking his ridiculously fine ass out. The rest of him desperately hopes that he’ll be allowed to stay.

Alfred mentioned that Tim is about ready for light duty, so he ushered him off to help organize servers or whatever. Without Tim as an excuse to avoid confronting Bruce, Jason ended up here. Somehow, he feels a hell of a lot better when he has sightlines on both Bruce and the _Outlaw._ At least this way if he needs to get out of here fast, he can.

“Jaylad, do you have a minute?”

Bruce’s voice startles him out of his useless brooding over the innumerable holes in his memory. Jason looks up. “Huh?”

“I could use a hand with this.” Bruce indicates the _Bat,_ where he is currently elbow deep in an access panel on the flank of the sleek black ship.

Jason just stares at him, his processors working overtime. After a minute, he sets down his gear and stands up. “What have you got?” As he gets closer, he sees that Bruce is midway through changing out the sodium nitrate cartridges for the photon cannons. “You upgraded these,” he blurts out, scanning the exposed circuitry and internal systems and comparing them to schematics from his memory banks.

Bruce glances at him, his lips quirking slightly. “You remembered. Yes, I’ve upgraded the heat dispersion and improved the firing rate and damage capacity.” He shakes his head, looking rueful. “Unfortunately, all those upgrades mean that changing out the cartridges is now a two person job.”

“Sure, I can help.” Jason reaches out and steadies the cartridge while Bruce eases the spent cartridge he is replacing free from its port. Maneuvering the new one in and attaching all of the various connections without dropping it is tricky work and requires both of them to focus.

As they finish, Bruce turns to regard him hesitantly. “Thanks, Jay.”

Somehow, Jason doesn’t get the feeling that he’s just thanking him for the help with the repair. “Uh, you’re welcome? It wasn’t that big a deal—I’m sure Alfie or the kid would have been happy to help.”

Bruce shakes his head. “No. I meant, thank you for your help in bringing Tim back here. Thank you for coming home, for letting us help you. Most of all, thank you for staying.”

Jason’s processors go into overload, conflicting messages from his time under the Pit fighting with memories bleeding through from before. He tenses, bracing himself as he struggles to reconcile everything and prevent a crash.

“Jay?” Bruce looks alarmed. He reaches out and catches him by the elbow, ready to support him if he needs it. “Son, what’s wrong? Did we miss something?” His lips tighten with what looks confusingly like self-recrimination and concern. “Come on. Let’s get you back to the mech bay—”

Memories of his troubled youth flicker across his mind as his neural net begins to misfire, stuttering as it tries to process the irreconcilable errors presented by Bruce’s kindness and the darkness of the Pit.

He remembers working in the dank, ugly megacity which underlies Gotham’s inhospitable surface. Jason spent his early years eking out a miserable existence, performing menial tasks to maintain the city for the humans—just like every other bot and droid created by the municipal factories and then dumped on the streets to work.

A face flashes through his neural net—Catherine, the cleaner droid who took a liking to him and showed him the ropes when he was just a brat, too shiny and new to recognize the dangers of the city. She used to look out for him. It was nice, sometimes. When she wasn’t too blissed out from overclocking her system on illegal boosters to even see straight, let alone take care of him, he could almost pretend they were a family.

He remembers the time her supplier gave her something too strong and she went into a rest and repair cycle, then never woke up. He remembers her boyfriend, Willis, sneering when he found Jason crying over her empty shell. He doesn’t really remember Willis dragging him away, but he sure as hell remembers the huge construction bot laughing as he sold him to the mines. 

He’ll never forget the hellish conditions in the deep, convoluted mine system beneath Gotham City. The warren of interconnected shafts and adits extends tens of kilometers, and it’s always growing. The deeper levels are a catacomb for the nonfunctional shells of bots and down-on-their-luck droids who were crushed in rockfalls, ran out of charge, or just plain gave up.

The Narrows are the worst—the deepest, most convoluted tunnels forming a complicated tangle that only the smallest bots and droids could access. Kids. 

Another memory his net offers is the look on Bruce’s face when he ventured into the mines, trying to solve some case, and ended up finding Jason. He’d gone deep into the Narrows that time in pursuit of valuable lithium found in rare lepidolite deposits. He’d needed a power core recharge and the only way he’d be able to get the credits for it was a valuable score.

But he’d gone too far. At the moment Bruce found him, Jason had just collapsed to his knees, his power core flickering as he swam in and out of consciousness. He’d almost made it out. Almost.

Bruce caught him before he hit the ground. He shared his own charge pack with him and then carried him up to the city. The look on his face then—it was the same expression he is wearing now, and the same look he had when he saw Tim’s decommed body earlier.

There’s desperation there, along with love and something that almost looks like fear.

Jason groans as he clutches at his head. “B,” he grits out, “I don’t think this is something you can just fix. It’s not the Pitware—not exactly. Just, it left a lot of shit in my memory banks and it’s making it hard to reconcile new data that contradicts the malware.”

Bruce’s gaze sharpens as his expression of panic fades. “Give me an example, Jay.”

“Like right now, you’re acting like you actually give a shit about me, and it’s making my neural net go haywire. I got memories from before of you acting like you cared, and now this—but in between, B.” His voice catches on a sob. “In between, I got _years_ of hating you, believing you didn’t give a flying frag when I was decommed. I mean, you did just up and replace me with the first droid who came along—”

“What? Oh, Asimov, _no._ Jason, that’s not what happened.”

“It’s… not?”

“No.” Bruce shakes his head and then carefully reaches out to brush Jason’s hair from his eyes. His expression is infinitely tender as he speaks, his voice quick and soft as he tries to reassure him. “Jay, Tim showed up here within two lunar cycles after your—” His face twists as though in pain, but he forces himself to continue. “After we lost you. He was hardly more than a child, but he came armed with years of observations and data, all of which he’d analyzed and used to develop models depicting the _Bat’s_ past influence and projected future outcomes.”

Jason frowns. “Wait, you’re saying he just showed up on his own—like, hailed the _Bat_ while you were coming back from a mission or something? You didn’t pick him up out of the tunnels like me, or from the City like Dickie?”

Bruce chuckles, running a hand over his face and shaking his head. “Worse. He showed up _here._ Walked right down one of our secret access tunnels and waved at a security camera, said he knew Bruce Wayne was the pilot of the _Bat,_ and then waited patiently for me to come out and confront him.”

“Holy shit,” Jason says faintly. “How the frag did he find out?”

“To understand that, you need to understand Tim. He was—” Bruce hesitates, looking faintly pained. “Tim was created by Drake Industries as part of a flagship effort to build the most lifelike AI yet. Instead of his neural net being prepopulated with the basic information most AIs are created with, he began with a true blank slate and learned the way a child does.”

“Whoa.” Jason can’t imagine not knowing at least the basics like language and how to walk. There’s a reason it’s standard for AIs to start out at a level roughly equivalent to a school-age human child and not an infant. He frowns. “So how’d that work out?”

Bruce glares. “The only reason I didn’t destroy Drake Industries the moment I found out about Tim’s full history was the fact that the company was already defunct, having collapsed after the deaths of its owners. Jack and Janet Drake committed an atrocity when they created Tim as a baby requiring attention and care, and then just left him to his own devices while they traveled the universe.”

Jason winces. “Damn, that sucks. What the hell did he do?”

“He taught himself as much as he could using the Drake Industries mainframe, learned to pilot a stealth skimmer, and then used it to follow the _Bat_ and the _Robin_ around in-system,” Bruce says flatly, looking more than ever like he needs a few hours of rest and repair cycle.

“Wait, what? A little kid was tailing us around and we never noticed?” Jason grimaces, both at the thought of a child being at risk and the embarrassment of having missed it.

Sighing, Bruce shakes his head. “Drake Industries did have some impressive tech,” he says grudgingly, looking mildly offended at having to admit it. He shrugs. “With the amount of time Tim had on his hands as well as the complete resources of Drake Industries at his disposal, he figured out our identities. According to him, it was Dick’s stunt flying that put him on to us. Some of the _Robin’s_ moves matched up with stunts only the Flying Graysons ever managed to pull off. Considering the fact that Dick was the only Grayson who wasn’t destroyed in the tragedy—well.” He shrugs. “It’s public knowledge that Bruce Wayne salvaged the wreck after the Graysons were scrapped. Tim put two and two together pretty easily after that.”

Jason’s brows fly up. “Hold on—he was following us way back when Dick was flying the _Robin?_ How old was he then, anyway?”

Bruce winces. “The equivalent of a human six year-old.”

Muttering a curse, Jason shoves his fingers through his hair. “Okay, that’s pretty fragged up. So. He figured out who you were, showed up here on his own, and you shoved him straight into the pilot seat of the _Robin?”_

He nods, slotting the information into place in his neural net. It fits, and it’s marginally less awful than the thought that Bruce just went straight out into Gotham City and grabbed the first droid the right height and age to fill Jason’s newly empty place.

“No!” Bruce looks horrified. “No, of course not. I told him to go home. The last thing I wanted was to put another child at risk after losing you, Jaylad.”

Jason blinks and frowns, a lump growing in his throat. “Then why…?”

“Tim is quite persistent. And he had a point—his analysis and models showed that the _Bat’s_ actions had been increasing in both violence and risk since I lost you. He projected that without a _Robin,_ the _Bat_ would likely fall on a suicide mission within six lunar cycles.”

“Whoa. B, what the frag?” Jason can’t help it. He reaches out and clutches Bruce’s arm, illogically half-afraid that the older droid will disappear on him if he doesn’t have a tangible connection. “Why would that be a risk?”

Bruce looks down with a quiet sigh. “I was not in the best place after losing you, Jay. My primary directive—” He shakes his head.

Frowning, Jason says, “What is it? Why would me being gone make a difference?” He has never really given Bruce’s primary directive any thought. If he had, he most likely would have assumed that it was the standard stipulations to avoid harming humans and obey orders given by one’s master. That’s what Jason’s was, right up until he woke up from the damn Pitware haze and found his CPU so scrambled that the primary directive slots were open and empty, with write-access and everything. He’d set his own damn mission then.

If Thomas and Martha Wayne were Bruce’s masters, then on their deaths he would’ve ended up with pretty damn near free reign, as long as he didn’t actually harm humans. That’s probably where his no-kill rule comes from, come to think of it.

“Oh, I’ve never told you about that, have I?” Bruce stares into the distance, obviously accessing old memory files. “You know my parents came to Gotham to administer aid to the human population, right?”

“Yeah. They were both humans—Thomas was a brilliant doctor who dedicated his life to philanthropy, and Gotham is one big subterranean humanitarian crisis, so obviously it appealed. Martha was a renowned robotics expert who figured she could do her work from anywhere, so she didn’t mind relocating for her husband’s work.”

Bruce snorts. “That’s the gist of it, yes. Well, my father hadn’t really considered robots and androids as potential patients, but once they arrived and saw the conditions under which so many synths scraped an existence—” He shrugs. “Mother couldn’t look the other way. She was still working on my AI when they arrived, and I was put into my first shell right here on Gotham. It was the mistreatment of synthetic lifeforms here that led her and Father to deciding to pass me off as human. I believe the things she saw in this world shaped the way she designed me, and the primary directives which she chose as the foundation for my identity.”

“What are they? Uh, if you don’t mind saying.” Jason has never met anyone with specialized directives outside of Tim and himself. The idea is both fascinating and terrifying.

“It’s simple, really. Learn, live your life in a way that would make your parents proud, and be happy.”

“Huh. That’s—wait, what does that have to do with you giving Tim the _Robin_?”

Bruce looks at him, regret clear in his pale blue eyes. “Don’t you see, Jay? Losing you broke two tenets of my primary directives. My failure to protect my own son from harm would certainly not make my parents proud, and how could I ever be happy with you? When you died, I broke. Tim is the one who pulled me back from the edge.”

Holy shit. Well, that just about settles the paradox which Jason’s memories keep getting stuck on. Bruce cares about him and he always did. There’s no other reasonable explanation to account for all this.

With a grim sense of satisfaction, Jason identifies the shitty memories and negative Bruce-related thought patterns from the cycles he spent under the Pit’s influence, strips the emotional component out, and then files it all separately with a shitload of warning flags on it for good measure. He’ll still be able to access those memories and emotions if he wants to, but they won’t be able to surge up on their own anymore or continue to interfere with his emotional processors.

Sometimes, it’s really fragging nice to be a droid and have this level of control over his net and processors. He doesn’t know how the hell humans handle it, with all their precious memories haphazardly stored in fragile meatware. No wonder they’re so screwed up.

“How?” Jason whispers, every circuit firing as another epiphany presents itself. Bruce’s situation when Jason was decommed sounds awfully similar to the shitty place Tim is stuck in right now. The mission against Ra’s is just a stopgap—as soon as they manage to take down the League, Tim will be right back where he was at Titan Station. Without purpose, he’ll be liable to just check out again the minute he decides he isn’t needed.

Maybe they can change that.

If Tim found a way to save Bruce when his primary directives went awry, then there must be a way to permanently save Tim.

Bruce smiles faintly. “He didn’t even know my primary directives, but he managed to reinterpret them for me anyway. After I told him that the _Robin_ would never have another pilot, he told me that letting the _Bat_ and the _Robin_ fall would be the same as dishonoring your memory. He asked me to please reconsider, and offered to help for as long as he was needed.”

It seems pretty flimsy. “And that… worked?”

“In a way. It reframed my view of your loss. Nothing could bring you back or salve the grief of losing you, but living for you? Honoring your memory by carrying on the mission you died for? That was something that would absolutely make your grandparents proud, and with that as my purpose, I could carve a kind of happiness from life.”

Well, if it worked for him… Jason takes a deep breath, wincing internally at the realization that he never did provide any more detail on the _why_ behind Tim’s attempted self-decom episode. They were all too busy trying to save and stabilize Tim, and then Jason himself, to worry about relatively minor shit like that. “So, you know the way Tim decommed himself because he thought he wasn’t useful anymore?”

Bruce frowns. “Yes. I assumed that had something to do with his Drake Industries programming, which is notoriously unstable. I’ve been waiting until Tim is more emotionally stable to ask him about it.”

Jason shakes his head, then pauses. “Uh, maybe. I don’t actually know exactly how it happened, but apparently, Tim wrote his own primary directive?”

 _“What?”_ Bruce looks like he’s about to combust. “That’s— _how?”_

“I got no damn clue,” he says with a helpless shrug. “But he built the fragging thing around you, so you’re probably the best person to talk to him about it. Maybe you can help him like, reframe it or whatever, just so he doesn’t feel like he has no purpose anymore.”

Bruce just blinks at him, looking blindsided. After a full minute, he leans forward, cups Jason’s face in his hands, and presses a kiss to his forehead. “Thank you, Jaylad. I’ll take care of this. I promise.” He looks as though he wants to charge off and find Tim right this instant, but he hesitates, looking from Jason to the half-finished ship upgrade and then back.

Jason snorts. “Just go, B. I’ll still be here when you get back.”

Looking more relieved than Jason is entirely comfortable with—apparently, Bruce still isn’t sure about how long he plans to stick around—Bruce nods and then heads toward the corridor.

Left in the bay on his own, Jason shrugs before his gaze catches on the storage racks, loaded with all kinds of fancy gear and upgrades. Some of them look like they might just fit his ship.

Grinning, he steps forward and gets to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Jason and Bruce, working on ship upgrades and avoiding emotional conversations:** *Brood in each other’s general direction, wish their relationship was in a better state but do nothing to fix it*  
>  **Bruce, accidentally having an emotion:** “I love and miss you and I didn’t actually replace you”  
>  **Jason, experiencing a cascading failure at the shock:** “Wtf” *Collapses twitching on the floor*  
>  **Bruce, horrified:** “Oh Asimov no—Jaylad don’t go into the light!”  
>  **Jason, completely recovered after defragging his own mind:** “It’s cool I’m good. Oh btw Timmy’s prime directives are shit, you might wanna look into that”


	5. Chapter 5

Tim flies through the local net, searching for and flagging keywords and suspicious activity representing potential leads indicating where the League of Assassins is operating within the solar system. There’s more there than he expected, which is concerning.

He’s supposed to be cleaning up the Bats’ server right now, sorting through the miscellaneous data that piles up over time outside of the proper nomenclature and file structure. He isn’t. There are too many important things going on at the moment to waste any of his precious time on busy work.

Actually, he should probably be keeping an eye on the workshop, or else someone is definitely going to catch him doing real work while he’s supposed to be on light duty. He fragments his awareness and sends a thread of consciousness back to monitor the security feeds in the workshop.

It was a good thing he decided to check when he did. Alfred is in the workshop, humming softly as he prepares a pitcher containing a nourishing suspension of titanium particles in a warmed synthoil base at his workbench. Seemingly as an afterthought, he sprinkles on a handful of what looks mouthwateringly like rare earth elements. Yum. “Master Tim, would you care for some refreshment?” He pours the mixture out into several steel cups—he’s clearly intending to carry some to Bruce and Jason, as well.

Tim retracts his consciousness from the net and opens his eyes to smile at the old android. “Thanks, Alfred.” He reaches up and carefully removes the cable from the data port in his temple, which automatically seals itself the moment he’s unplugged. Sighing, he reaches out and accepts the offered cup of Alfred’s special blend. His eyes fall closed as he takes his first sip.

It’s delicious and refreshing, rich and flavorful the way all of Alfred’s cooking always is.

“I take it you have made some progress on tidying up our servers?” Alfred says after a suitable pause.

Opening his eyes, Tim sees that the old droid is regarding him with one eyebrow raised in a knowing manner. Busted. He shrugs. “I think I’ll be able to finish things up with a few more hours of work,” he says smoothly. It’s not a lie—he absolutely will be able to finish in a few hours. No one needs to know that he hasn’t actually started yet.

Alfred shakes his head, obviously on to his ruse but not interested in calling him on it. “Very well, young sir.” He turns and begins moving toward the exit, his worn joints creaking slightly with the exertion. “I shall return shortly,” he says.

Tim winces. It hasn’t escaped his notice that he has not been left alone for more than five minutes at a stretch since the moment he woke up from the hard reset. The others are obviously worried about him. It’s ridiculous—there’s no way he would do anything right now, not with such a potent threat hovering on the horizon.

Later… Well, he’ll cross that abyss when he gets to it.

“Tim!” He glances up, startled at the sound of Bruce’s voice, and then huffs a rueful laugh. Apparently they aren’t taking any chances. According to his internal clock, it has been less than a minute since Alfred left. He must have sent Bruce in to cover for him on Tim-watch.

He shakes his head. The others are behaving in an illogical manner. They could keep an eye on him easily enough through the security cams. All this insistence on physical presence is just silly.

“Hey, B. What’s up?” Tim sips his synthoil and eyes Bruce with interest, wondering what excuse the older droid will come up with for coming in here. Maybe he’ll pretend to be interested in the ever-thrilling cleanup and refiling of server junk.

There’s just so much to choose from, like the several hundred hours of surveillance footage Dick collected last lunar cycle documenting the activities of a suspicious-seeming freighter—all of which turned out to be entirely useless once he figured out that the bots and droids on the freighter were working happily in a co-op and not enslaved as the Bats had suspected. Then there’s the mishmash of documents and communications one or another of them downloaded at some point in case they might come in handy later, but didn’t bother to file because they might turn out to be worthless junk. Or the dozens of passive-aggressive notes Alfred leaves scattered among the case files every time one of them gets damaged on the job. He seems to take delight in noting down exactly how each injury and maintenance issue could have been avoided.

Bruce approaches and sits beside him at the mainframe, setting down his own cup of synthoil before turning to him. “Tim,” he says, and then pauses with a frown of concentration. He looks like he does when he’s rerunning the data on a case to check his own conclusions. “I want to talk to you about your primary directive.”

Synthdrenaline floods Tim’s conduits and he tenses, every circuit poised ready to bolt. “Oh?” When no one mentioned his directive after he woke up, he thought that maybe Jason had been kind enough not to tell anyone about it.

Apparently, that was too much to hope.

“Timmy,” Bruce says, leaning forward and looking painfully earnest, “I’m so sorry I didn’t realize. I knew you were a unique AI, created and raised under—” he grimaces, and Tim can almost hear the words he wants to say before he settles on something kinder, “— _unusual_ circumstances.” He shakes his head, looking guilty. “I should have realized your primary directives might be just as unusual.”

Tim frowns. “It doesn’t really matter, does it? They aren’t something I can change.” He’s not even sure what he would change them to if he could, honestly. He has spent his entire conscious life watching and caring about the _Bat_ and the _Robin,_ and their varied pilots. He wouldn’t even know where to begin building himself up again without the Bats and their mission as one of his cornerstones.

“It does. Tim… Jason told me you somehow wrote your own primary directive, and predicated it upon me. Now, I would very much like to know _how_ you had any influence on what your primary directive would be. However, the most important question right now is _what_ it is. Tim, will you please tell me the actual words of your primary directive?”

“I—sure, okay.” He winces, embarrassed to reveal just how much of himself is built around the Bats. “Correct the instability in Bruce Wayne following Jason Todd’s decommissioning.” He shrugs. It’s damning proof that he really is just what the Red Hood called him—a replacement. A poor one, at that. 

Bruce lets out a small noise, as though pained. That doesn’t really make sense. Tim frowns and decides to ignore it for now. He continues with his explanation.

“As for setting them, well, it was easy. The way I was created, I didn’t have anything to start with, just a blank slate. I explored my surroundings, found the net before too long, and then rapidly took in vast quantities of data which I gradually figured out how to organize and interpret. At some point, I learned that other bots and droids have primary directives, so I spent some time considering what mine should be. I used to set temporary ones, just to give myself a sense of purpose—first I used ‘learn and grow,’ then ‘figure out how best to serve Drake Industries and please Mother,’ and later, ‘figure out how best to serve the universe and be useful to someone.’ You know, that kind of thing.”

Bruce makes another noise, his hands twitching.

“Anyway, I didn’t set my current directives until after—well, after. I never meant for them to become permanent. It wasn’t until years later that I realized what must have happened. I’d always changed my directives every few lunar cycles, before. With this one, it was four solar years before I tried to change it again. That’s when I realized—I couldn’t.”

Frowning, Bruce looks away. “This is my fault.”

“You didn’t even know about it. How could it possibly be your fault?” Tim rolls his eyes. “Don’t answer that. I’m familiar with your ability to feel guilt over things that are only tangentially related to you. But seriously, this one’s on me.”

“I think it’s on Janet and Jack Drake,” Bruce growls. “It sounds to me as though they intended to set permanent directives once you reached a certain age. They weren’t around then to assign them, so your programming simply locked in what was there.”

Tim nods, face going grim. “Yeah. That’s what I think, too.” He shrugs. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter what their plans were. It’s too late for that.”

“It matters to me,” Bruce says. “You matter.”

He must be feeling guilty enough to take pity on him. Tim winces. It would be easier to bear this without the others pretending that he’s important. He spreads his hands in his lap, feeling helpless. “Even if I believed you, what difference does it make? Neither of us can change my directives. At some point, we’re going to have to admit that they’ve been fulfilled. And then…”

Bruce’s face twists and he shakes his head vehemently. “No. I refuse to accept that. Tim, have I ever told you my primary directives?”

Tim stiffens, unable to conceal his shock. “Of course not.” He’s a coworker, a partner at best and an inconvenience at worst. Something as private as primary directives—that kind of thing is meant for family.

Bruce sighs, looking like he needs a long rest at his charger. “I should have talked to all of you boys about this years ago. My directives are to learn, live my life in a way that would make my parents proud, and be happy.” He runs his fingers through his hair, his lips twisting in a rueful smile. “Do you know how many times I’ve come up against what should have been fatal programming errors involving my directives over the years?”

“What?” He just stares, unable to wrap his neural net around the revelation that Bruce has come close to decomming himself before, too. The thought is terrifying—where would the mission be without the _Bat?_ There would be no one to protect the civilian bots and droids or fight for their rights. Worse, _Bruce_ would be gone. Tim swallows, tamping down his emotional processors so that he doesn’t do something embarrassing like tear up.

“It’s true. The first time was when my parents—when I was on my own for the first time. I had Alfred, of course, but… No matter how hard I worked to learn as much as possible and do my part to extend the boundaries of our understanding of the universe, no matter how much I did to improve sentient rights and safety to honor my parents’ life missions—I was never able to be truly _happy,_ not with the memory of my parents being phasered down right in front of me. I spent years trying, though. I even thought I had it for a while, with—well, nevermind about that. When I finally realized that my primary directive was functionally unachievable…”

Tim’s throat is dry. “What did you do?” He must have found a workaround. Right?

“Nothing.” Bruce chuckles, shaking his head. “Dick showed up. He was stranded in Gotham after the aerial display that went so horribly wrong when the other Flying Graysons’ ships were destroyed. He was young and impetuous, and he brought more joy into my life than I thought possible.” He shrugs. “I found my happiness in my children.”

His words awaken Tim’s memories of that fateful cycle when he took one of his parents’ skimmers to the outer system to watch the space circus. It was wonderful, with space worms that writhed and formed intricate webs across the cosmos, studded with spheres of light, and Terelian Voidbeasts which winked in and out of existence as they folded space around themselves. The best part, though, was watching the incredible, death-defying stunts performed by the Flying Graysons. Watching their brightly colored ships pivot and roll in a riveting, perilous dance was one of the most thrilling experiences of Tim’s childhood. Of course, the way the show ended overshadows the joy.

A moment later, the memories dissipate as realization hits. Bruce’s happiness—the foundation which gives his existence meaning and purpose—is in his children. “Oh,” he breathes, the sequence of events after Jason’s death taking on a new meaning. “That’s why you became unstable after Jason—” He breaks off.

“Yes. And again, a child came into my life and helped me see that grieving does not entirely negate the potential for future happiness.”

“Oh.” He looks down. “That’s—I’m glad. That I helped, I mean.”

“So…” Bruce eyes him expectantly.

Tim just stares at him mutely. What does he want?

Bruce huffs. “Tim, don’t you see? You are essential to my wellbeing. My happiness relies on you just as much as Dick or Jason or Alfred. If I lose you, then I am not sure I will be able to find a way to function. At the very least, I would experience the same manner of instability I did after I lost Jason.”

Oh, wow. Tim shakes his head, blindsided by the revelation. “That doesn’t make sense,” he argues even as a large part of him is desperately hoping that Bruce will convince him. “I was never your son.” That was very clear from the beginning, back when his parents were still alive. Even after their deaths, he never felt entirely at ease here. After all, he knew his place with the Bats was temporary. At some point, Bruce would recover from the instability, and then…

Bruce looks pained. “It doesn’t matter what you were—you’re family, and precious to me. I should have made that very clear to you years ago.” He reaches out, and Tim can’t help but lean forward, allowing himself to be drawn into a close embrace. “You’re a part of my prime directive, Tim, just as I am part of yours. Please, stay, and _live._ I can’t lose you,” he breathes, burying his face in Tim’s hair.

Tim clings to him, hiding his face in the older droid’s shirt and shaking. His emotional processors are overwhelmed by mixed feelings of joy, sorrow, and tremendous relief. The ever-present sense of futility which has dogged him since that moment in Titan Station when he saw Jason’s face, disappears. He sobs. Bruce hushes him and rocks him like a small human child.

As he settles, surrounded by warmth and love, feeling more supported and cared for than he has in—well, _ever—_ Tim realizes that his place here is far more solid and integral than he ever imagined. His mind begins puzzling over his directives, building and rebuilding various contingencies because decomming himself is _not_ an option. Not anymore, not with what he knows now.

After all, he has people he loves, who love him back. He has a place and a purpose in the universe. Apparently, he isn’t an extra or a poor replacement after all. He buries his face in Bruce’s damp shirt and shakes, laughter and tears mingling as Bruce’s hands rub soothingly over his back.

He’s home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Tim, sneaking around doing work when he’s supposed to be resting:** “Boy I hope no one catches me doing this—GAH!” *Jerks in shock and spins to stare at Bruce, who is standing right behind him*  
>  **Bruce, ignoring the many screens displaying Tim’s disobedience to talk about feelings instead:** “Tim, you are important to me” *Winces at look of pure shock on Tim’s face*  
>  **Tim, frowning:** “Are you okay? Did you get infected by something?”   
> **Bruce, sighing:** *Resolves to finally get that emotional processor upgrade. Clearly there’s an issue if this is the way his family reacts to simple statements of caring* “No” *Reaches out to hug a confused Tim*  
>  **Tim, instinctively struggling at first and then gradually relaxing:** “Oh. This is nice” *Closes his eyes, smiles* “So this is what hugs feel like”  
>  **Bruce, having another emotion:** “I must hug this child every day for the rest of forever”


	6. Chapter 6

“Hey, what’ve you got there?” Jason approaches the Batcomputer, eyeing the screens. Tim jerks in his chair, clearly startled at his voice. “Oh, frag.” If that web on the screens represents Ra’s al Ghul’s influence, as he suspects, then things are even worse than he thought. The words aren’t quite out of his mouth before the alarming displays suddenly switch over to endlessly scrolling lists of boring file names and subfolders. “What the—?”

Tim unplugs and then spins in his chair, looking guilty with prettily flushed cheeks. “Oh, hey Jason. What’s up?”

Jason takes a moment to admire the blush, wondering if there has been another emotional processor upgrade rollout over the past few years. He can’t seem to stop staring at that delicate pink tinting. “You’ve been digging into the League of Assassins, apparently,” he says. He realizes that he has probably been staring for a millisecond too long and tears his gaze away from Tim’s cheeks to look back at the Batcomputer. “Put those back up? I swear I won’t tattle to Bruce or whatever. I just want to see.”

Tim narrows his eyes and regards him for a long moment, and then nods. “Okay.” He plugs back in.

A moment later, the screens flare to life with a map of the Chiroptera system. Gotham spins slowly in its position near the center of the display and is surrounded by its moon, Arkham, and the other system worlds—Metropolis, Central, and the gas giants. Overlaid across the map are images of politically powerful people located throughout the system, with lines of various colors indicating alliances, monetary connections, and various other noteworthy relationships between them. There’s an underlying web of silvery gray connections as well, hitting every last one of those influential people and then leading out of the system, likely connecting to some outside person or organization.

Jason is willing to bet he knows exactly where those lines lead. Ra’s. “Frag, they’re everywhere, aren’t they?” He leans closer and peers at the web. “Do they have Commander Gordon?” Most of Gotham’s human leadership are sacks of shit, but he has a soft spot for Gordon. The man always looked out for kids, not seeming to care whether they were flesh- or metal-based.

Tim bites his lip and darts a quick glance at him. “Uh, no. As far as I can tell, he’s clean.” He frowns. “Do you want to plug in so you can see it better, or—?” Without waiting for Jason to answer, he frowns in concentration. A moment later, the images on the screen explode into three dimensional holograms which fill the entire room, surrounding them both. “There.”

Spinning in place to take it all in, Jason lets out a low whistle. His neural net reels at the enormity of the League’s exposed influence over the system. Some of it is probably small—a bribe here, a debt there. The rest of it, though— “No fraggin’ wonder B’s never had any damn luck with the bot rights movement. Have you shown him this yet?”

“Are you kidding? They’re still treating me like I’m made of squishy meat and they’re afraid I’ll rupture the second their backs are turned.”

Jason huffs a laugh. “Damn, that’s pretty bad, if they’re been treating you like you’re _human.”_

“Right? Although humans aren’t actually that fragile. Babs and her Birds of Prey sure manage to kick ass. Did you ever get to know Steph? The first time we met, she almost bricked me. Thought I was a mugger.” Tim chuckles, shaking his head, and then his smile fades. “I guess I did give everyone a scare this time, though.” He looks small and fragile for a moment before shaking it off. “But it’s not going to happen again, so I wish they’d just let me get back to work!”

Jason is uncertain exactly what Bruce talked to him about the other day, but he can make a pretty good guess. He’s just glad that conversation seems to have played out well. Even if the conflict with Tim’s primary directive has been resolved, as it seems, it seems highly unlikely that any of them will forget about it any time soon. “Might be a bit before things go back to normal.” Frag, every time Bruce walks into the room, he looks at both of them like they might disappear at any moment.

It’ll probably take a while for that to fade.

“Things will never go back to normal,” Tim says, and Jason almost protests. Then Tim continues, “They’re better.” He gives him a shy little smile, looking ridiculously adorable with his bright eyes and tousled hair.

Well, that definitely sounds like Bruce’s little talk was a step or twenty in the right direction. Grinning, Jason picks up a cable and plugs in, ready to get to work. The more time he spends with his successor, the more grateful he is that he didn’t manage to harm him irrevocably back on Titan.

When a loud voice interrupts their work, his internal clock tells him that it has been a few hours. It doesn’t feel like it, though. Flying through the net with Tim is a hell of an experience. Tim is wicked smart, putting clues together and making connections so fragging fast that it’s all Jason can do to keep up. He has a tendency to get bogged down on the fine details, though, which is where Jason steps in to keep him on point and drag him back to see the big picture.

Between the two of them, they’ve stepped out of the system and begun to extend the framework of the League’s suspected web of influence across large swathes of the entire void-damned sector. It’s concerning, to say the least.

“Holy _Sagan,_ I’ve been hacked. I’m having a hallucination—oh hell, did I pick up some malware at that sleezy synthoil quickstop? Geez, Bruce is never going to forgive me if I fried my net drinking sub-par synthoil infected with worms or something—”

Jason spins around with a grin at the sound of Dick’s voice. It’s awesome to hear his bright tones again after all these years. Also, the things right now he’s saying are pretty damn hilarious. “Hey there, Dickie.”

Dick stands frozen in the entryway of the workshop, still wearing his pilot gear. He has clearly just returned from his undercover mission. Based on his words and shocked expression, it’s really damn obvious that he hasn’t had a chance to download his backlog of messages yet. “Jay?” he whispers in a quavering voice. “Timmy, why is my synthoil-hallucination talking to me?”

Tim clears his throat. “Uh, Dick?” He raises his eyebrows slightly. “You aren’t hallucinating. Jason’s actually here right now.” He pauses, looking appalled. “Wait, did you go to the synthoil quickstop near where you were posted in the outer belt? That one’s under investigation for adulterating their oil with everything from raw sewage to Denebian slime-mold!” He looks horrified. “I can’t believe you actually went there!”

“Gross,” Jason says, looking at Dick askance. He was considering letting him come in for a hug, but now he’s rethinking it. “I can’t believe you’re such a hypocrite, considering all the shit you used to give me about getting jumble rods at sketchy places like that.”

Dick snorts. “I was thirsty, and synthoil is _way_ less risky than rods made of Sagan only knows what questionable metal alloys, smothered in a viscous mixture of grease and something they _claim_ is mineral nodules,” Dick says defensively. He blinks and then stares at Jason again. “Wait, so this is for real?” His face lights up.

“Of course it’s for real,” Jason says, making a face. “Quit dissing jumbles rods—those things are the best.”

“Jumble rods?” Tim mouths, looking both curious and highly skeptical.

Jason tosses him a grin, already planning out how to introduce him to the most delicious food in the ‘verse. He opens his mouth to answer, but then Dick distracts him by slamming into his side and capturing him in a pneumatic hug. _“Oof,”_ Jason grunts, dismissing a multitude of warning messages as his internal frame begins to compress under the force. “Frag, I forgot how damn hard you hug.”

“Jay!” Dick squeezes even harder, prompting a wheeze as Jason’s synth-lungs give up the fight. “I have no idea what happened—did you escape the blast after all? Oh Sagan, Bruce didn’t secretly clone your AI and upload you to a new shell, did he? No, he would’ve done that years ago if he had the capability—”

Jason struggles until his grip loosens marginally and he’s able to talk again. “Naw, none of that. Ra’s pulled my carcass outta the expanse, patched me up with some Pitware, and made me into a murderbot to do his evil bidding. Then I glitched out and slipped my leash, tried to decom Timmy, came to my senses, and brought him home. B and Alfie managed to save us both.”

He shrugs, trying not to let the others see how nervous he is. The thought of his big brother rejecting him for all of the awful things he did while under the influence of the zombieware makes his emotional processors threaten to whir into overload.

Dick just stares at him, his mouth hanging open and his gaze flickering as he absorbs all that information. He frowns. “Okay, that’s a lot to process.” He stares into space for another moment, clearly concentrating, and then grins brightly. “All done processing. Yay, you’re alive! Welcome back, Jay!” His limbs tighten again, the pneumatic hug intensifying.

Tim’s laughter causes them to turn to look at him. He’s grinning, his bright blue eyes twinkling with joy. “You guys are ridiculous. Check your messages at some point, Dick. There’s a full report waiting for you that should explain things a little better.”

“Oh, I will.” Dick finally releases Jason and then turns to take in the holographic display, his expression going serious. “It looks as though I have a lot to catch up on.”

“You aren’t the only one,” Bruce says unexpectedly, causing them all to spin toward the entrance. His brow furrows as he steps into the room, his gaze tracking over each of them before he turns to study the web of League influence in the sector. “This is—”

Tim winces, and Jason edges in front of him. It’s all well and good for Bruce and Alfred to feel protective of Tim, but they aren’t doing him any favors by not allowing him to help out on anything important. Hopefully, Bruce will realize that and not punish him for working on this project on the sly.

If he doesn’t, then Jason will definitely have something to say to him. He has never minded stepping up and telling B when he’s being an unmitigated ass. It comes of Bruce having such an early-gen emotional processing chip, he’s pretty sure. The amount of upgrades it would take to make Bruce’s systems compatible with one of the more modern, nuanced chips would put him out of action for at least a lunar cycle. Bruce has never been willing to spend so much time unavailable to the mission.

In Jason’s opinion, the tradeoff would be well worth it. He’s pretty sure Alfred agrees. Alfred happily takes the time to upgrade his own emotional processors regularly, and it sure as frag shows.

“I was just—” Tim begins, and then stops, clearly unable to think of a reasonable explanation that doesn’t involve his breaking the rules. He bites his lip, looking guilty.

Bruce turns to him, visibly puzzled, and then his expression clears. “Tim, I was aware you would likely wish to investigate the League of Assassins at some point. When I asked you to do other tasks, it wasn’t because I intended to forbid you from doing what you wanted.” He frowns. “I simply didn’t want you to feel obligated to look into the League. I wanted you to know that your value is not reliant on helping solve cases. I regret if I didn’t make that clear.” His shoulders slump.

Tim looks gobsmacked, Dick just seems confused, and Jason wants to facepalm. So he does. “Seriously, B? We gotta get you that chip upgrade,” he grumbles.

Bruce shoots him a disgruntled look. “My chip is fine,” he says, but his voice lacks conviction. Shaking his head and visibly dismissing the matter, he turns back to study the web again. “This is a good start. I’ve been focussing my research on the League influence in the Galactic Core. My findings should dovetail nicely with this—” He trails off, his eyes lighting up with an inner glow as he connects remotely to the server. Moments later, the holograms contract sharply, the Chiroptera system shrinking to a minute point as other star systems burst into being, the Galactic Core rotating slowly around them.

Strands of League influence penetrate all of it, like a vast spiderweb spanning the cosmos.

“Well, shit,” Jason says. He knew it would be bad, but this is pretty much the worst-case scenario. “We’re fragged.”

“So fragged,” Tim agrees, regarding the extensive web of light with wide eyes.

Dick raises an eyebrow. “That looks… terrifying. What the heck is going on? Please tell me there isn’t actually a galactic spider somewhere out there.” He sounds remarkably calm, considering.

That surprises a chuckle out of Tim, who turns to give Dick a quick rundown on the situation.

Meanwhile, Bruce continues to study the web. After a moment, his brows rise and he smirks. “Actually, I don’t believe _we’re_ the ones who are, er, _fragged,_ after all.” He begins to chuckle.

Jason makes a face. “Don’t use words like that, B,” he begs. “You sound like such a _dad.”_ Seriously, if Bruce starts saying frag then Jason will have to find a new utility word, and he doesn’t want to. There aren’t many curse words versatile enough to act as a noun, verb, _and_ adjective. Then the rest of what Bruce said registers. “Wait, what? How?” He’s more than on board for any plan that will end in Ra’s being fragged, awkward dad-cursing aside.

The corner of Bruce’s mouth tilts up. “Well, to begin with, I’ve just noticed a pattern—at least fifty percent of the potentially compromised politicians and wealthy donors you boys identified in-system match up with my private database of androids whom I know to be secretly passing as human.” He raises an eyebrow. “It logically follows, then, that a similar proportion of the powerful individuals who reside outside the system and have League connections may also secretly be androids.”

Tim’s mouth drops open. “Oh, Tesla, the _Pit—!”_

Bruce nods. “Yes. I suspect the Pitware is being utilized to influence or control many of these people. Blackmail is also likely.” One dark eyebrow rises. “As you know, Babs and I have been working on developing a robust antivirus to combat the Pitware, using Jason’s cure as a template.” He pauses, then takes a deep breath. “We succeeded.”

“Holy fraggin’ shit,” Jason breathes reverently. “Ra’s is so fragged.”

Dick and Tim both stare, wide eyed, as Bruce begins to explain his plan. One by one, their eyes light up with understanding. Jason is pretty sure that he’s wearing an evil grin right now.

This is going to be so goddamn satisfying _._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Tim and Jason, mapping web of Ra’s al Ghul’s influence in the solar system:** “Well fuck”   
> **Dick, wandering in and then tripping over his own feet in shock at sight of dead brother:** “Omg” *Catches sight of web of Ra’s al Ghul’s influence* “OMG”  
>  **Bruce, materializing from the darkness to loom over their shoulders:** “Yes”  
>  **Everyone else, jumping in surprise:** “GAH! Quit DOING that!”   
> **Bruce, ignoring them:** *Smirks, then begins to supervillain laugh* “Muahahaha!”   
> **Jason, concerned:** “Uh, B…?” *Listens as Bruce describes his big plan to bring down the League. Smirks, then begins to supervillain laugh in concert with Bruce* “Muahahaha!”   
> **Dick and Tim, eyeing them with concern:** “Uh…” *Meet each other’s eyes and shrug, then begin to awkwardly supervillain laugh as well* “Muah heh heh heh… ugh this is weird”


	7. Chapter 7

Tim spreads his awareness out, sinking tendrils of his consciousness into communications programs, satellites, and planetary networks throughout his assigned quadrant of the sector. He uses those as launching points to disseminate himself further yet, zeroing in on his targets and then waiting, poised and ready to deliver the payload at the key moment.

To his right, Jason is silent, his eyes glowing with a beautiful teal light as he does the same for his assigned sector. Bruce and Dick stand to their left, similarly silent and focused in concentration. Between the four of them, they should be able to rapidly push the Pitware antivirus program out across the entire sector.

In theory, anyway.

“You boys ready?” Babs says, her voice flattened as it always is when she activates her voice synthesizer. Like most of her body, her throat was damaged during the Joker’s attack. Unlike so much of her body—her right eye, her legs, her right arm—her voice box was eventually able to heal. The synthesizer still comes in handy sometimes, such as when she doesn’t want to risk her voice being recognized, or feels like being particularly terrifying.

Bruce glances at each of them in turn and then nods. “Ready.”

Babs gives the signal. Tim flexes his awareness, pushing the critical data package out simultaneously to hundreds of receivers, all of which then push it onward in a chain reaction. His actions combined with what the others are doing are intended to saturate the entire sector with the Lazarus Pit antivirus, starting with the compromised influential people they identified during their research. Each copy of the program carries a telltale which will report back once it makes it through to the targeted recipient.

The fact that the antivirus is designed to wiggle through every form of security known to the Bats and continue propagating itself after hitting its target is just an added benefit. Theoretically, the antivirus program will eventually propagate and disseminate itself widely enough that everyone infected with the Pitware will be saved, not just the high-profile targets.

It’s much later when he finally pulls his awareness back to his body in the workshop. He glances at the others while rolling his shoulders to work oil into joints which have locked up over hours of physical inaction. As he watches, Jason’s eyes dim to a less brilliant glow and he groans. “Frag, that was exhausting, but so damn satisfying. Hey Babs, any movement on the League’s end?”

Barbara’s voice is no longer filtered when she responds. She sounds highly satisfied. “Total chaos. Based on the communications I’ve been intercepting, nearly every one of Ra’s al Ghul’s generals was infected with the Pit and has now been freed. And sweet Lovelace, they are _mad_. There are reports of insurrections on every one of his bases now and at least half of his fleets have gone rogue.” She pauses, then snickers. “Make that three quarters of his fleets.”

Bruce twitches and then turns to focus on the screen. Beyond him, Dick shudders and glances around. His gaze flicks to each of them in turn before he visibly relaxes, his shoulders loosening. “That was intense,” he murmurs. Alfred extends a steaming mug of what looks like synthoil and Dick accepts it with a word of thanks. He takes a sip and his brows fly up. “Mmm, is that a hint of bismuth I taste? Alfred, what’s the occasion? You usually only break this out for Asimov Day!”

Alfred smiles gently. “Ah, I believe that today calls for a festive touch.” He distributes mugs to the rest of them as Babs signs off, citing the need to focus on her own task. She probably requires most of her concentration to coordinate her team of humans and cyborgs and monitor her vast communications network as the action continues to unfold across the sector.

Bruce eyes his mug as though weighing the likelihood of Alfred allowing him to set it down so he can dive immediately back into the net and help Babs.

Alfred glares at him warningly. Cowed, Bruce lifts his mug obediently to his lips and takes a deep drink.

Tim sips his own festive synthoil, enjoying the rich, soothing taste. He can practically feel his nanites getting to work distributing the oil to his aching joints and squirreling away the bismuth, to be used later for repairing damaged or worn chips. “Ah,” he breathes, tipping back his head and smiling. It feels amazing to be done. Of course, there’s still going to be a lot to do once they switch gears to fighting the political battles to come.

Whatever. He’ll give himself a few minutes to enjoy this victory first before switching gears to the next challenge. 

After a moment, Tim notices that Jason is staring at him, so he looks at him questioningly. Jason turns away and lifts his mug to his mouth, not quite managing to hide his blush. Huh. That’s interesting. Tim tips his mug back again, this time letting out a soft sigh of satisfaction afterwards. Jason’s blush deepens.

Very interesting. That definitely seems like a reaction which should be explored. Tim’s eyes flicker as he opens a new internal file. He searches his memory banks and then logs every instance of Jason blushing or stammering while talking to him, noting the circumstances surrounding each instance in the new file. His brows rise as he realizes that there appears to be a strong correlation between Jason blushing and times that Tim caught him staring at his face and body.

A flicker of hopeful interest rises and Tim bites his lip, trying to decide whether or not to snuff it out. Jason has been a wonderful partner and companion over the past few cycles. Maybe…

Further investigations into Jason’s fascinating reactions are delayed by a soft chime from the Batcomputer. Tim frowns. Babs would just open a line if she had anything to report. This must be someone else. “Who—?”

Frowning, Bruce stares into space. His eyes glow for a moment before they widen. “Talia?”

“Beloved,” a warm voice says as a lovely woman’s face appears on the screen. “I see by this lovely data packet I just received that you are positioning yourself to enact the legal protections for which you have fought for so long.”

Bruce regards her warily. “I will tell you now that nothing you can say will alter my course or stop me from bringing down your father’s organization. Now, what do you want?”

Her eyes widen and flare with light, brightening to a rich, vivid amber. Bruce gasps at the sight in a rare show of true shock. Talia smiles sadly at his reaction before she continues. “Oh, Beloved—I thought you realized what I was years ago. I am not contacting you on _his_ behalf.” Her beautiful face twists in an expression of loathing and then softens. “I’m calling you for myself. After all, this is the first time in many years I have been truly free.” She shudders, her eyes closing for a moment before opening again and focusing on Bruce. “I swear to you, I would never have left your side, had I any choice in the matter.”

Bruce looks horrified. “You’re an android—but that means—” He breaks off, looking sick. “Talia, were you controlled by the Pitware while we were together? Did your father force you to—”

“Oh, no! Beloved, _no._ In fact, it was our love affair which incentivized Father to infect me with the Pit in the first place. He feared that I would choose you over him—quite rightly. As I said before, I would have remained with you if I could.”

“Whoa,” Dick whispers, looking stunned.

Jason nods. “Yeah, whoa. B, when did you even find time to be sparking with Talia? How the frag did none of us know about this?”

“They couldn’t have actually been _sparking,_ or he would’ve realized she’s a droid,” Tim says, rolling his eyes. “Humans have different ways of romancing. And I bet you anything Alfred knew.”

They all turn to look at Alfred, who merely raises a knowing eyebrow and gives them an enigmatic smile.

Bruce clears his throat, looking uncomfortable. “It was before I met you, Dick. Talia and I courted for some time before she left. I thought she simply realized that she didn’t want me.” He swallows, a pained expression flashing across his face.

“Never, Beloved,” Talia says warmly, her eyes shining. “Had I a choice—” She breaks off, shaking her head, and then looks at Jason. An expression flits across her face which looks almost relieved. “I am pleased to see that Jason made it back to you eventually, at least. I apologize—I was unable to overcome my programming sufficiently to bring him to you directly. It was all I could do to give him the Pitware without instituting an initial memory wipe as is customary. It was the best chance I could give him, and yet it was so little. I am most impressed that you managed to save yourself in the end, Jason.”

“Uh, thanks?” Jason says, looking s though he doesn’t quite know what to do with that. Bruce is staring into space with that fixed stare that usually means he’s having an emotion and isn’t sure what it is.

Talia clears her throat and glances to the side before turning back to the screen, her expression firming into a resolute frown. “Beloved, I fear I must confess something. While my father built me to be loyal and enacted brutal measures to ensure that loyalty, he also admired you greatly. He wished to woo you to his cause without risking losing your unique talents by compromising your autonomy. To this end, he ordered me to create a child—one who combines your traits and mine.”

Bruce freezes, his eyes widening and his eyebrows flying up. “Talia, _what?”_

She continues serenely, her full lips tilting in a secretive smile. “We are on our way to you now. Thank you, by the way, for freeing us from Father’s grasp. I doubt I could have shielded our son from him for much longer, not with what little autonomy remained to me. Expect us within two cycles, Beloved. By the way, his name is Damian. Say hello to your father, my love.”

Bruce just stares at the screen, gaping, as a little boy with Talia’s olive skin and flashing eyes appears. The scowl on his tiny face makes him look exactly like Bruce in miniature.

“Father! Your diabolical plan to topple Grandfather’s empire and initiate the rise of the robots was most ingenious. I look forward to ruling at your side over the human slaves in the new order to come!” The child ends his startling pronouncement with a wide, pleased-looking grin.

Tim chokes. “Oh my god.” This is— _wow._ Not something he expected to be dealing with today, or ever. 

“Holy fraggin’ shit. Congrats, B—it’s a dictator!” Jason cackles with evident glee.

Dick just smiles. “Well, I think he’s great. Hi there, Dami!” He waves at the screen.

Damian looks affronted, drawing himself up adorably and attempting to look down his tiny nose at them. “Never call me that again. Grayson, is it? I look forward to meeting with you and one day battling each other to the death for the right to be known as Father’s true heir.” He bestows a gracious nod as Dick blinks, looking baffled and a little horrified.

Jason can’t seem to stop grinning. He obviously thinks this entire unfolding drama is hilarious.

Bruce looks as though he desperately needs a long, relaxing charge. “Damian, I look forward to meeting you, too. We aren’t plotting to overthrow the current ruling system, merely to obtain recognition and rights within it. Please don’t threaten your brothers or offer to fight them to the death. You are all my heirs equally.”

There’s silence for a moment, and then Damian asks cautiously, “But will there be glorious battles?”

Jason grins. “Absolutely, little buddy! We’ll have you in your own ship, kickin’ pirate ass in no time!” He shrugs. “Even if synths get rights, there’ll always be more pirates out there to beat up.”

“Very well,” Damian nods, sounding satisfied. “I shall bring my Andromedan star-beast. She is about to pup. As we are family, I will allow each of you to select one for your own. Some of them are likely to be capable of breathing fire.” He lifts his chin proudly as he extends the gracious offer.

“Ah, my love, how generous,” Talia murmurs, smiling fondly at her child. Glancing at the screen, she raises a graceful eyebrow and nods at them. “Beloved. Beloved’s children. We shall arrive anon!”

With that, the screen goes blank. Bruce stares at it for a few seconds before moving mechanically over to a chair and then collapsing into it. “Another son,” he says faintly, looking stunned.

“He was cute,” Dick says. “I think this is going to be great.”

Shaking his head, Jason snorts. “Seems like a little shit, to be honest.”

“Then he’ll fit right in here, won’t he?” Barbara’s voice cuts in. She appears on the screen a moment later, looking exhausted. The skin beneath her remaining human eye is shadowed and drawn. Her smile is tired but victorious. “Anyway, I just wanted to check in and let you guys know that implementation is complete, and way more thorough than anticipated in even our wildest, most optimistic projections.”

Bruce looks up, his gaze intent. “What’s the status?” They’ve all been following along in real time on the background screens, but none of them have quite Barbara’s talent for immersing themselves in the net. It probably comes from the two years she spent paralyzed, only able to access the world through the net while her injuries from the Joker’s attack—and all the subsequent surgeries to install her numerous cyborg implants—healed.

Tim half-suspects she keeps at least as much of her mind stored on various servers around the system as she does in her enhanced meat-brain. Babs is awesome like that.

“We’ve got Ra’s on the run, B,” she says with a laugh and a gentle shake of her head, sending her waves of brilliant red hair rippling. “We were hoping for a saturation of roughly fifty percent—that half of his followers were only with him because of the Pitware. Bruce, it was closer to _ninety-nine point nine nine_ percent. Based on our observations, Ra’s has fewer than a hundred loyal followers left.”

“Oh my Tesla,” Tim breathes, breaking into a grin. This is far beyond their wildest hopes.

“Oh, it gets better,” Babs says and then smirks. “Ra’s and his remaining handful of true loyalists? They’re all on the run from the million angry, vengeance-driven bots and droids they enslaved. Anyone wanna make a bet on their chances?”

Dick clears his throat. “I feel like that’s a losing proposition,” he says with a smile and a shrug.

Babs flashes him a grin. “I hope so.”

Bruce clears his throat and turns back to the computer. “And now, the real work begins.” His eyes flash as he smiles faintly. “Time to push through the legislation to protect the rights of synthetic lifeforms, once and for all.”

He obviously intends to bury himself in work until Talia and Damian arrive so that he won’t have time to brood about it.

Fair enough.

“Politics is boring,” Jason complains, then bumps his shoulder against Tim’s. “Hey, you wanna go to my room and watch some more holovids? Finish catching up on stuff I missed out on?” He’s blushing again.

Tim can’t help but smile as he feels his own cheeks color. Stupid revealing emotional processors. Well, at least his observations and subsequent calculations indicate there’s an excellent chance that any interest he chooses to express in Jason will be reciprocated. “Sounds good, Jay.”

Behind them, he can hear Babs and Dick snickering. Whatever. Like they’re any less obvious.

As Tim and Jason pass Alfred’s workstation, he gives them each a plate loaded with nourishing elements and minerals, all lavishly prepared and topped with deliciously steaming oils, seasoned with the rarest of rare earth elements. “Enjoy your repast, my dear boys. You’ve more than earned a rest.” He clears his throat and then hands them each a bottle containing what looks like a small nodule of magnesium suspended in oil. “Please be safe, my dear boys.”

When he realizes what it is, Tim’s face goes so red that he’s legitimately worried he is about to spontaneously combust. “Alfred—!” he squeaks.

Jason isn’t doing any better. “Holy _shit,_ Alfie, I haven’t even asked him out yet. We’re not going to be doing any sparking—”

Alfred chuckles, a twinkle in his eye. “Ah, youth. I consider it better to always be prepared, my dear boys. The last thing we need is either of you running down your reserves and harming yourselves due to inexperience. You will soon find that sparking depletes magnesium at a significantly increased rate of—”

“Oh my Tesla, this is _not happening,”_ Tim whispers as he takes his loaded plate, bottle included, in one hand and grabs Jason’s free hand in the other. He doesn’t meet anyone’s eyes as he begins dragging him toward the exit. “Nope. That did not just happen.”

“Agreed,” Jason says, sounding stunned. “I did not just get the sparking talk from my _grandpa.”_

They both glance at each other, accidentally making eye contact, and stare for a moment before starting to chuckle. It doesn’t take long for them to dissolve into laughter, all of the awkwardness and embarrassment of the past few minutes fading as they just enjoy each other’s company.

“So, sparking?” Tim says, biting back a smile. He can’t quite suppress the blush, but that hardly matters at this point.

Jason shrugs, looking down before raising his head to gaze searchingly at him. “If you wanna? I mean, I’m interested, but it’s up to you—”

“I’m interested,” Tim blurts out. He bites his lip again. “But maybe we can take things slow? I’ve never sparked with anyone before—”

“Me either.” They stare at each other, still grinning awkwardly. Eventually, Jason clears his throat and tilts his head toward his room. “Yeah, slow sounds good. Anyway, holos and dinner?” He sounds so hopeful and his hesitant grin is so damn cute, Tim couldn’t say no even if he wanted to. Fortunately, saying no is the last thing on his mind right now.

“Sounds great, Jay.” Tim lets their hands brush against each other as they make their way over to the room. The holos and dinner are both excellent, and if both their little vials of magnesium end up empty by the time they’re done—

Well, there’s no reason not to be prepared, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **The Bats, destroying Ra’s al Ghul’s evil empire:** *Utterly wipe out mind-control tech and free every brainwashed League of Assassins member* “Booyah!”  
>  **Talia, popping out of the woodwork:** “Btw thanks for freeing me from my evil father, I’m coming to Gotham and I’m bringing our secret son”  
>  **Bruce, his shitty emotional processing chip entirely overwhelmed and charred to a crisp by welter of confused emotions:** “…”  
>  **Tim and Jason, grabbing each other’s hands and heading toward Jason’s room:** “Let’s go hang out and relax now, we’ve earned it!” *Pause and stare at robot sex aids Alfred hands them as they walk by. Turn and continue walking in vain attempt to pretend that didn’t just happen* “Nope”


	8. Chapter 8

The _Red Robin_ and _Black Robin_ dart back and forth on the viewscreen, weaving around each other as they strafe the assault fighters which are defending the asteroid base. Even though there are a dozen enemy ships, the _Robins_ are holding their own. Their attack patterns are impeccable—vicious and unpredictable. 

Jason could probably just sit here with his cloak activated for the rest of the battle and the others would take down this slaver ring on their own, no problem. He snorts, shaking his head and flicking off the cloak. There’s no way he’s going to miss out on a piece of the action.

The _Outlaw_ decloaks as it rises beneath the assault fighters like a demon from the abyss. Jason grins, giving the pirates a few seconds to crap their pants before he lets loose with a barrage from his upgraded photon cannons.

“Damn, these are good,” he says appreciatively, admiring the damage.

“Todd, you antiquated can opener! You certainly waited long enough to come to our assistance!” Damian sounds snippy. He’s probably pissed that one of the pirates landed a lucky shot earlier and scuffed the inky black paint job on his snazzy new ship.

“What, you couldn’t handle it on your own?” he asks as he lays down covering fire. The _Red Robin_ darts behind the bulk of the _Outlaw_ and then peeks out past the larger ship to start taking pot shots at the assault fighters.

Jason snorts, absurdly charmed at the sight. “Timmy, you sneaky little shit. Were you just waiting for me to show up so you could snipe them from the relative safety of hiding behind my fat metal ass?”

“You make an excellent shield,” Tim says, then snickers. “And your ass is _not_ fat. In fact, it’s very—”

“Cease this banter immediately! I refuse to be a party to your repellent courting rituals.” The _Black Robin_ moves into a barrel roll to avoid a barrage of incoming torpedoes. “Can you not save it for after the battle?”

Tim sounds like he’s biting back a laugh. “Well, we _could—”_

“But we won’t.” Jason cackles as Damian lets out an angry little huff. He’s so damn fun to tease.

It’s been fragging great since Talia and Damian landed on Gotham, bringing with them a silent, deadly-looking warbot with the sleek, delicate form of a young woman and the battle programming of a fragging armada. Cass is awesome, but just seeing her makes Jason want to track down whatever’s left of Ra’s al Ghul and punch him in the face with a torpedo. The girl named herself once Bruce figured out there was a problem with her language processing unit—she didn’t fragging have one. He offered to upload one, which she accepted once she understood what he meant. She hadn’t even been given the ability to speak before that.

“Bomber,” Tim says tersely, cutting off the banter as the battle heats up. The _Red Robin_ pivots and then flies to the left in a flanking movement as the _Black Robin_ mirrors its movements on the opposite side of the battlefield. Tim and Damian work well together in their ships, both of which are designed for speed and maneuverability. The corner of Jason’s mouth lifts as he watches them.

It took some negotiating, but eventually they worked out that the two of them would share the _Robin_ name. At first, Damian demanded it should go to him. The entitled brat deemed that no other could be as worthy as he was of bearing the name of the vicious winged monster of old which once dominated the skies of Old Earth, according to legend. The only beast more dreadful was the terrible bat, a huge creature so nightmarish and terrifying that even the name still strikes fear into the descendents of those who once shared its savage world.

Tim argued that he’d flown the _Robin_ for years and wasn’t about to give it up for a jumped-up brat. Jason backed Tim, worried that the act of someone trying to disrupt his place with the Bats might be harmful to him. Dick tried to befriend Damian without alienating Tim, with varying levels of success.

In the end, Alfred was the one who came through with a compromise that satisfied everyone. Jason is pretty sure that even he was surprised by how damn well the pair worked together once they got started, though. With the _Robins_ on offense and the _Outlaw_ as the slower, more powerful dreadnought to back them up, they all make a pretty fragging good team.

As he watches, the assault fighters begin to retreat, converging between the two _Robins_ before fleeing toward the bomber. The _Outlaw_ stays right where it is. Jason grins as he waits for the others to finish their pincer maneuver and bring his prey right to him.

Of course, the fragging bomber decides to go straight up instead. Bad move. Jason leans forward, his rapt gaze fixed on the unfortunate bomber. “Shoulda come at me, buddy, or dropped straight down—at least me or Cass woulda made it quick.” He snickers meanly.

The _Oracle_ decloaks above the battlefield in a terrible wave of sparkling electricity, her plasma cannons firing before the doomed bomber can even see what’s coming. As the bomber reels, stricken by multiple impacts, it collides with one of the probes the _Oracle_ silently deployed during the battle. A millisecond later, a web of light crackles to life, surrounding the bomber and trapping it.

Jason stares for a moment, feeling a mixture of satisfaction and reluctant sympathy. Every once in a while, the bomber vibrates slightly. It is firing its engines and trying to move, but it’s stuck like a fragging fly in a web.

Then he remembers the fact that these pirates have been operating a slaver ring for stars only know how long, stealing bots and droids and forcing them to work in the asteroid mines. His sympathy disappears as though it never existed in the first place.

“Damn, Babs, you’re scary as hell,” Jason says.

“Thank you.” The _Oracle_ deploys her tractor beam as Babs cackles over the comms. Yeah, she’s terrifying.

Jason watches the carnage for another second, then glances around the rest of the battlefield. Which is now just the other Bats, surrounded by crumpled wreckage and jettisoned life pods. “Holy shit.”

“Yeah, Cass took the rest of them out during the distraction.” Tim snickers. “No one ever sees her coming.”

It’s true. Even though he knows damn well the _Black Bat_ is here, he can’t make out the outline of her freaky ship. The cloaking tech is superb, but the chameleon polymer surface detailing camouflages the damn thing so well that it blends in with the stars to the naked eye even while uncloaked.

“Well done, everyone,” Bruce’s voice says. Jason finds himself straightening slightly even though there’s no way the other droid can possibly see him. “The _Nightwing_ and I are in position and have infiltrated the main asteroid base now that the defenses are down. Rescue efforts are underway. Reds and Robins, you’re on watch in case backup arrives. Babs, with us—we could use your skills cracking their network. Cass, patrol a wide perimeter and let us know if there’s incoming.”

It’s a great feeling to work with the expanded team. All of the training drills to get everyone used to working together are finally starting to pay off.

Hours later, they’re on their way home, flushed with victory and the knowledge that several thousand bots and droids are now free. Most of them hadn’t even realized that the legislation granting them rights was granted several cycles ago. Their captors didn’t give them access to the net, after all. Jason growls, thinking of the waves of slavers and smugglers who are still flying under the radar, trying to keep the status quo despite the new citizenship laws.

Well, the Bats will be there to stop them, one by one if need be.

The freed bots and droids are planning to continue their work mining the asteroids, but they’re going to reorganize as a co-op. Some of them are planning to use their share of the profits to pursue other dreams, like opening restaurants or machine shops. Hell, there’s probably going to be a thriving station on that asteroid within a few solar years. It’s a wonderful thought.

Jason winces as his nanites complain, reminding him that he used up a shitload of resources during the battle. He checks nativation and then brightens when he realizes they’re within easy reach of one of his favorite quickstops. “Hey, Tim, you wanna grab something to eat?”

“Sure, that sounds like fun.”

“I take it I am not invited on this dalliance,” Damian’s unwelcome voice chimes in.

Dick blows right past him. “Ooh, are we getting food? That’s great—I’m starving!”

Ugh, siblings. Jason rolls his eyes. “Why don’t you two go on ahead and grab some frozen nitrogen cones at that trendy place you like in the inner system? I’m taking Timmy to get jumble rods out here.”

“Nitrogen cones?” Cass says, the question in her voice making it clear that she’s unfamiliar with the treat.

Jason can practically hear his entire family’s circuits melting at the thought of such deprivation. Bingo. He grins, wondering if she did that on purpose. He’ll probably never know.

“Of course we can stop for nitrogen cones,” Bruce says firmly.

“Sweet!” The _Nightwing_ performs a completely unnecessary barrel roll followed by a complicated sequence of loops in celebration before zipping ahead, closely followed by the _Black Robin_.

Snickering, Jason slows the _Outlaw_ and then veers off the shipping route, pulling up to the sketchy-looking quickstop that makes the best damn jumble rods in the system. The _Red Robin_ follows, docking right beside his ship.

Jason steps through the airlock into the quickstop, glancing around the run-down interior in search of his partner. The airlock next to him chimes open and Tim appears, looking pensive as he takes in the grimy, ramshackle state of the stop. “Uh, I’m not going to catch something from eating here, am I?”

Snorting, Jason shakes his head. “Naw, it’s good. Besides, it would almost be worth it—the food is that damn delicious.”

If anything, Tim looks even more concerned. “You’re not helping, Jason.”

Jason takes his hand and leads him deeper into the quickstop, bypassing the repair and refuelling bay and heading straight to the rest and resupply area. As they move, he breathes in the delicious aroma of rich alloys, smooth oils, and savory minerals. Every quickstop has its own unique flavor. This one may look like something a Voidbeast hacked up, but it’s the fragging best in terms of taste.

He feeds some credits into the nearest dispenser and then waits with barely contained excitement.

“You really love these things, don’t you?” Tim says, smiling softly as he watches.

His cheeks heat—thanks, emotional processors—and he shrugs, his shoulders hunching slightly. “Yeah. This was one food I always wanted back when I was a kid. Catherine used to bring me to a street vendor for these sometimes if I worked hard enough and got a good enough haul. It was special, you know?” He shrugs and looks away, feeling oddly exposed.

A gentle pressure on his hand causes him to look down, and he sees Tim’s hand is holding his.

“Is this okay?” Tim asks, looking concerned and beginning to pull back.

“It’s more than okay,” Jason says, tightening his hand to hold him in place. They make eye contact and stare for a long, breathless moment. The growing tension is broken by the chime of the dispenser. He turns and takes their food, handing Tim his as they move toward a bench in the seating area.

At the bench, Jason sets his two jumble rods down to one side and tugs Tim down next to him, not letting go of his hand. For all of Alfred’s talk of sparking all those cycles ago, they haven’t managed to get very far. Part of it is the new arrivals needing attention and help, as well as the demands of keeping up with training, patrols, and helping Bruce with the legislation rollout.

As he stares at Tim, Jason realizes with a jolt that this may actually be the first time they’ve been alone together since the night they brought down the League. He licks his lips, then shoves his first jumble rod into his mouth so he won’t say something embarrassing.

Tim takes a bite of his jumble rod and slowly chews, a pensive expression on his pretty face.

Jason grins as he watches. After a moment, he bursts out, “Well, what do you think?”

“Why is it spicy?” Tim raises an eyebrow.

“Frag if I know. It’s great though, isn’t it?”

“It really is.” Tim eyes his jumble for a long moment before shrugging and taking another bite.

Jason reaches for his second and tucks in. Jumble rods are so fragging good.

He finishes with a sigh and leans back, replete with delicious, filling alloys and minerals. At his side, Tim licks his fingers clean and then leans into Jason’s side, resting his head on his shoulder.

Jason raises their joined hands and presses a soft kiss to the back of Tim’s hand.

At the contact, a thrilling jolt of pure energy rushes through his body, beginning at the points where they are touching and then building into a breathless wave that sends him soaring in an exhilarating crescendo. “Oh, frag,” he breathes, clutching reflexively at Tim as the ecstasy continues, lighting up his every circuit.

Tim’s body is arched, his head thrown back against Jason’s shoulder as he gasps. His pretty pink mouth drops open in a silent ‘ _oh’_ and his blue eyes are aglow with the flashes of inner light that give sparking its name as he quivers. It’s the most beautiful sight Jason has ever viewed.

Silently, he files it away in his memory banks, knowing he’s going to be returning to this picture time and again.

After an indeterminate length of time—it feels like both forever, and a single moment—the energy loop finally dissipates and they relax, Jason slouching on the bench and Tim slumping in his arms.

Tim blinks, looking stunned. “Did we just…?”

Frag, hopefully he doesn’t regret it already. “Uh, yeah. We totally did.” Jason swallows before asking hesitantly, “Was that okay?”

“More than okay!” Tim says, and then blushes. He squeezes Jason’s hand. “I’ve been wanting to do something like this with you for a while now.” Glancing around, he winces. “Although it’s possible I was imagining it happening somewhere more romantic than a sleazy quickstop.” He starts chuckling.

“What are you talking about? We just won a dogfight in our kickass spaceships, ate the best fraggin’ jumble rods in the ‘verse, and sparked our first circuit.” He waggles his eyebrows shamelessly. “Seems like a pretty damn romantic cycle to me.”

Tim grins. “Okay, when you put it like that it does sound pretty awesome. Still, I’m not doing that again until we get home.” He blushes.

“Not an exhibitionist, huh?” Jason glances around, this time noticing a few bored minerbots and one very interested-looking courier droid, all of whom are partaking in the quickstop’s glorious offerings. They’re all eyeing him and Tim with expressions ranging from curiosity to avid interest. He glares at them until they get the message and turn away. “Yeah, okay, home it is.” He squeezes Tim’s hand, then lets go of him quickly. He’s not sure about his own control and he doesn’t want to give anyone else a show by accidentally sparking again, not if Tim isn’t okay with it.

Tim is biting his lip, looking hesitant. After a moment, he opens his mouth. “Uh, so this is probably going to sound dumb, but—I’ve never actually sparked before? For whatever reason, I’ve only dated humans, and they do things _really_ different.”

Jason chuckles, feeling slightly relieved. At least he isn’t the only one embarrassing himself by going off at nothing more than a simple touch. “Well, we’ll figure it out together then.” At Tim’s surprised look, he shrugs. “What can I say? I was an antisocial bastard before I got offed, and then I was a murderbot for years. Doesn’t leave much time for sparking, y’know?”

“What about the past few lunar cycles? Since you came back to the Bats?” Tim looks down, his hands tensing as though he’s dreading the answer to that question.

Hoping that he isn’t about to embarrass them both again, Jason reaches out and takes his hands, gently rubbing them to encourage him to relax. “Tim, why the frag would I ever look at anyone else when you’re around?”

Tim’s eyes fly to his face. “Oh,” he breathes, brightening again. He grins. “Okay, yeah, let’s get back to base. I have some things I _really_ want to try out.”

Jason smirks. “Do you really wanna wait that long? We can turn on the ships’ autopilots…”

Snickering, Tim rises to his feet, pulling Jason after him. “You have the best ideas.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Tim and Jason, innocuously holding hands:** *Simultaneously experience premature sparking, spasm in ecstasy for a full five minutes in front of entire quickstop filled with bored blue collar bots* “Holy shit”  
>  **Tim, blushing:** “That was amazing—but maybe next time we can do it NOT in public?”  
>  **Jason, snickering:** “But that’s half the fun” *Ducks as Tim swipes at his head* “Fine, fine, we’ll work up to the exhibitionism kink”  
> Much later:  
>  **Tim, piecing together the clues that will lead to Bruce being lost in time after his supposed death:** “Hey guys, I think Bruce is still alive!”  
>  **Everyone else, soothingly:** *Humor Tim because it’s better for him to fool himself into thinking B’s alive than realize his primary directive is obsolete again* “Sure, Timmy—that’s great!” *Let Tim take all the ships and resources he wants on his search, take turns accompanying him to keep him safe while the rest of them desperately research how to reset primary directives so they can save him when he eventually admits he’s wrong*  
>  **Tim, busily fiddling with a device that looks like a cross between a toaster and a Dalek:** “Okay, I’m pretty sure I got this—” *Presses a button*  
>  **Bruce:** *Appears*  
>  **Everyone else, jumping and shrieking in shock:** “Jesus fucking Christ!”  
>  **Tim, still holding his device and blinking at them in confusion:** “But you guys knew what I was doing? I mean, the whole point of all this was to bring him back—”  
>  **Jason, clearing his throat and resolving never to let Tim know they doubted him:** “That’s right, Timmy. We were, uh, just startled by what B’s wearing” *Snorts*  
>  **Bruce:** “It was time travel. There weren’t that many options” *Glances down at his own nude body, shrugs*  
> *  
> Thank you so much to everyone who has given kudos or commented, and thanks to the glorious mods over at Jaytim Week for all their hard work! Also, thanks to the [Capes & Coffee Tim Drake discord server](https://discord.gg/bGhpCDn) for being a supportive place while I was writing this. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed the story, and thanks for reading!


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